Mario Duchesneau

INSTALLATION
09.03–09.27.1992

The Clark Gallery kicks off its fall season with an exhibition of recent works by Mario Duchesneau and Pierre Gauvin, running from September 3 to 27, 1992. The opening reception will take place on Thursday, September 3, at 7:30 p.m. These two artists—one working in installation and the other in photography—share a keen sense of humor that supports and enhances the richness of their visual works.

“From one exhibition to the next, Mario Duchesneau has a knack for turning our belongings ‘upside down’ and our drawers inside out (Nuit Blanche, 1990)! Like a mockingbird, he now turns his attention to the homes of our songbirds—the birdhouses that adorn our gardens and balconies. Here he presents a “house-sculpture,” or rather the skeleton of a small house whose structure comprises more than 300 birdhouses made of planed cedar. The result of painstaking work, these birdhouses were crafted one by one, then interlocked and assembled to form the sculpture’s beams. With its highly distinctive visual appearance and the humorous function it suggests, this work—with its unexpected forms—follows in the tradition of stacked, inverted, and “repurposed” furniture that characterizes this artist’s work in the field of installation art.”