Mathieu Beauséjour
Julie Favreau
Steven Brower
Patrick Martinez

MONTRÉAL | BROOKLYN
10.19–11.24.2012
Gallery

In the framework of the Montreal-Brooklyn project, Clark is presenting four artists who have been brought together as pairs: Julie Favreau and Patrick Martinez in the big room, and Mathieu Beauséjour and Steven Brower in the small room. Serendipitously, the two duos have adopted the same strategy to display their respective works. In each case, one of the works blocks the other, which is made visible through the intermediary of a window or through the interstices of a huge mesh.

Julie Favreau / Patrick Martinez

Favreau’s and Martinez’s practices are linked by a shared interest in the conditions underpinning our sensory experience of an object or a place, even though the former creates more narrative works than the latter, who prefers open propositions that lend themselves to viewer appropriation. With, Anomalies, Favreau is presenting an installation and a video portrayal of four characters in scenes that evoke fields of knowledge in the broad sense: a laboratory where samples are handled, a woman who dances with a compass, a man playing with a suspended network reminiscent of planet mobiles, and another man who is levitating. The outmoded appearance of the selected objects or the images derived from them gives a vivid sense of the rapid development science and technology have undergone due to progress. The characters level of concentration—of extreme attention—and the slow rhythm with which they handle the objects act as a counterpoint to the acceleration of knowledge, all the while revisiting the idea that the fields of science and belief are perhaps not as far apart as we think. A grate, suspended in the air, functions like a microscope stage; it serves as a platform for various objects that have been placed under observation in reference to the video sequences.

Occupying the passageways, the transition zones that notably lead to Favreau’s work, a network made up of thousand of straws assembled using connectors dubbed LINX, spreads out in an organized chaos that threatens to contaminate the whole room. Flirting at once with the art and design fields, Patrick Martinez’s works can be said to operate like a developing agent that exposes the particularities of the relationship between the viewer, the work and the exhibition context. One could easily view this mesh as a reference to cellular networks, to the structure of matter, but the initial idea behind this project consists rather of an attempt to fill the space with emptiness—hence the use of straws, these small air-filled tubes, which give a presence to the intangible. LINX is also a—fully acknowledged—industrial process based on a sculptural principle that Martinez has developed for commercial purposes and which is made available as a construction game that people can purchase and try out for themselves. In this in situ installation, the gallery space becomes the studio and laboratory of the artist, who will use his LINX connectors as a raw material to create a work onsite that will consist of the accumulation put on display.

Steven Brower / Mathieu Beauséjour

A sealed round door blocks the entrance to the gallery’s small room. Through the door’s window one can view a jerky video of a gagged man who is set against a red background. He tries to speak, but not a peep reaches us from the interior. We are provided with precise instructions to activate the mechanical system whereby one can depressurize the interior space in order to open the hatch and enter the space to view the work. This door, which serves as an airlock, was conceived by Steven Brower, an artist whose practice is rooted in both the R&D of functional devices linked to the aerospace domain and the creation of visual arts installations. A DIY whiz, Brower views his works as pretexts to acquire knowledge in sectors he knows nothing about—such as how to make a space shuttle, a space suit, or a technical installation to produce a new type of biodegradable material. The sole employee and head of BPL (Brower Propulsion Laboratory)—a company that develops space missions without financing—Brower draws a parallel between the aerospace and visual arts worlds by indicating that these are two fields dedicated to basic research whose results are rarely useful for industrial purposes. As a result these sectors offer a real free space where researchers/artists can reflect without having to know beforehand what their experimentations will lead to, and what use their discoveries may eventually be put to.

Mathieu Beauséjour’s proposal, Don’t worry Darling, There will be more Riots in the Spring, is comprised of a video installation in the small gallery. To access it, one has no choice but to activate Brower’s work, which transforms the room into a safe area. Inspired by the printemps érable (“maple spring”), the project shows a white-haired man in suit and tie with an egg in his mouth. He mumbles in a very expressive manner. He seems to be angry, shook up by the video’s rhythm, but also because he seems to be gasping for air. The incomprehensible words could be seen as an ironic reference to “political doublespeak”, but Beauséjour specifies that the character is rather in a process of conjuring, i.e. he is seeking to ward off evil spirits by way of a magical practice. The eggs, which have also been placed in the room, serve as a metaphor for the birth of a new generation, and, by extension, for the young Quebecois who took to the streets to protest and defend their right to education. An education that is increasingly subject to market pressures, and all the negative consequences inherent in this situation. With this work, Mathieu Beauséjour, who continues to pursue his exploration of places and forms of power, is returning to a more direct protest aesthetic.

– Anne Marie St-Jean Aubre

Julie Favreau, Anomalies, 2012

Sound design : Guillaume Van Roberge

Performers : David Albert-Toth, Catherine Cédilot, Nicolas Patry, Manuel Roque, Lin Snelling

Thank you : Claudine and Stephen Bronfman, Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec, Centre Est-Nord-Est, Atelier Clark.

Patrick Martinez would like to thank Alun Williams, Thomas Gerhardt, Caroline Rys-Martinez and Centre CLARK’s team.

Mathieu Beauséjour would like to thank Peter Dubé, Gaétan Nadeau, Brigitte Henry, Guillaume-Van Roberge, Nancy Belzile, Conseil des Arts du Canada et les carrés rouges.