Patrice Duhamel

LE CATALOGUE DES VENTS QUI ONT SOUFFLÉ
03.08–04.14.2012
Gallery

Over a ten year span, Patrice Duhamel(1970-2008) developed an artistic project in which drawing, video, music, art criticism and curatorial practice echo each other. Three years after his death, the centre CLARK, of which he was an active member, is dedicating an exhibition to him by offering a collective of artist-curators the two gallery rooms, so that we may appreciate the surprising meanders of his thoughts and visions.

The exhibition Le catalogue des vents qui ont soufflé is part of a series of events paying homage to Patrice Duhamel’s work. The first monograph dedicated to his work will be launched during the exhibition opening. This book, which includes texts by Sébastien Cliche, Sylvie Cotton, Charles Guilbert and Bernard Schütze, as well as a never published text by Patrice Duhamel focuses on various interconnected aspects of his practice. On March 22, a program of selected videos will be presented at the Cinémathèque québécoise as part of the 30e Festival international du film sur l’art (FIFA). A DVD set of his complete video works, produced by Vidéographe, will be launched on this same occasion.

An existential bricoleur

Our strangeness to the world, to others and to our ourselves is an underlying problematic in Patrice Duhamel’s work. Drawing inspiration from his personal experience and often casting his friends and loved ones in his videos, Duhamel approached these questions with a blend of humour and lyricism. The permeability between his personal life and artistic activity lends his work an intense and fragile quality. Both in his videos and drawings, characters grapple with their affective inadequacies and undertake all kinds of experiments in the hope of making connections that go beyond mere convention. Space plays an important role in this quest: in the videos, characters bump into walls or obstacles that lock them in; whereas in the completely open space of the drawings, they hover and risk even to disappear. The exhibition presented at CLARK extends this reflection on space by proposing three distinct places for the works, each of which provides a particular entryway into the symbolic spaces dear to the artist.

Le camp

The last of Duhamel’s seven installations Le camp (2007), is projected in the main room. This work is displayed as a double projection in which spatial and temporal markers are blurred, since the two images are sometimes identical, and at others surprisingly out of phase. Roaming through an industrial space divided by walls, the tracking camera reveals a fresco of loosely related characters, since each is absorbed by a strange and particular activity which serves as an allegory of their way of occupying space.

The drawing

The gallery’s second room is entirely dedicated to Duhamel’s drawings. Though the artist was initially recognized for his video work, starting in 2001 he created an abundant corpus of drawings which was enthusiastically received. In these works one encounters the same themes and sometimes even the same characters as in the videos, however in this case the bodies are truncated, fragmented or disfigured. The marks which usually outline a body or an object, here have a vibratory quality which evokes a state of great vulnerability. In this vast mosaic-like display, the viewer will discover the inventiveness and agility of the drawer who can be at once scathing and remarkably gentle.

Le cabinet

A third space, especially set up for the occasion, gathers elements from all aspects of his practices: wall drawing, notebook-works, musical compositions and videos. This more intimate room, which we call the “cabinet,” is inspired by Duhamel’s characteristic space settings. Immersed in this plethora of works, viewers will be able to get a sense of the fragmentary and multidisciplinary logic that underpins his work. The side-by-side display is intentional and includes, among other things, preparatory sketches for his video works, the video I don’t know what I want but I know how to get it (2004), music by the experimental trio Gringoplaza and notebooks excerpted from theParaguay project.

This centre CLARK exhibition, as well as the publication, video evening and DVD box set, seeks to bear witness to a generous work of great aesthetic and philosophical coherence. Even though he was very engaged in the Montréal art milieu and enjoyed much support during his all-too-brief career (he notably participated in important events such as Le Mois de la Photo and La Manif d’art, and presented his work abroad on several occasions, in particular as part of the European Media Art Festival tour), Patrice Duhamel remains little-known. The far-reaching and authentic work he has left us deserves to be seen, contemplated and appreciated.

Sébastien Cliche and Charles Guilbert

Tradiction Bernard Schütze