Shedding light on the unpredictable

By Quat’sous

“Being a member of an art collective such as the DF ART PROJECT allows me to come face to face with my position as an artist compared to that of others inspired by a similar receptivity to the human form. This, in turn, nourishes and questions my own creativity which could, in other circumstances, grow sterile due to circular practice.

Direct carving into large pieces of wood is the result of my quest for immediate sensory effect. By this I mean a non-conceptual, non-intellectualized record of the traces etched into the very fibre of what is now inanimate matter, a history of its living growth. Every time, I witness this improbable union of echoes, of personal emotion birthed freely. The discovery of these traces is therefore offered up to the visitor in connection to their own affect. I wish to share this experience.

Direct carving, hands raised, is the only possible means to uncovering something which is already there –  the buried, unpredictable elements of a presence which used to inhabit this living being, something my actions can unveil and reveal. The formalisation of presence into elements of human figuration is structured much like the letters of an alphabet – we can describe these beings, these woodland spirits, using an animist language.

When a face is presented using this approach, it triggers a polarisation of the whole work. A face is a glance, is in fact held aloft by the strongest lines of the piece – it has become the epicentre of a possible direction. The lines project the gaze of the figure and constitute something akin to the omega of the entire piece – a physical posture anchored in reality.

Placing this atemporal work within an architecturalised structure assembled from various materials offers a more contemporary presence, in relation to the place where the work is presented. This installation is determined either homogeneously or in contradiction to the internal sensitivity of the carved wood.”