HAPPY FEW
La Fratrie
Monumental
Group exhibition
07/04/2022 - 28/05/2022
Space N°4, Space 3 bis
Monumental, architectural or majestic. Sculptural, sublime or prodigious… If a sculpture is considered the representation of an object in space, how do we conceive of this space when it comes to exceed human size? Galerie Loft is pleased to invite you to the exhibition "MONUMENTAL" with works by Bernard Quentin, Francesco Marino Di Teana, Guillaume Piéchaud, La Fratrie, Philippe Hiquily, Philippe Druillet, Quentin Garel, Wang Keping, Yazid Oulab.
Monumental, architectural or majestic.
Sculptural, sublime or prodigious…
If a sculpture is seen as the representation of an object in space, how do we conceive of that space when it comes to exceed human size?
Dialogue or mise en abyme, our perception of the work as much as that of our own body, are disturbed. The work-object then becomes a landscape, it takes us into a new universe.
For more than fifteen years, Galerie LOFT has begun its adventure in this field. Over the course of many collaborations with its artists in the context of major projects such as the Shanghai Universal Exhibition (Philippe Hiquily, Girouettes H.12m - 2010), the Al Maaden Golf Sculpture Park in Morocco ( Gilli, Hiquily, Segui, Yazid Oulab, Daniel Hourdé, Sunil Gawde - 2013), the presentation of monumental sculptures in public spaces (Marathonienne et Épicurienne H.5m, place Saint-Germain-des-Prés in Paris-2012) or during the exhibitions (Marino di Teana, Citadel of Sisteron – 2017), it has thus gradually become one of the French leaders in the realization of these works and today accompanies young artists in the design and production of large format pieces ( Quentin Garel, Yazid Oulab, La Fratrie…).
Metal sculptures with shimmering, smooth or rough skins, bright colors, vibrant reflections or subtle patinas, the monumental works presented today on the occasion of the new exhibition at Galerie LOFT are real supports for experiences. To touch, caress or immortalize, it's a safe bet that they will surprise by the richness of the universes of the different artists who gave birth to them. So many worlds and stories to discover. As many face to face for an immersion in the heart of the sculpture.
Artists
Bernard Quentin
Art is a language, a unique form of expression that allows artists to experiment as well as for the public to have intense and new feelings. Amongst these artists that have in the 20th century known how to question the world, there is a man who, in his 96th year of age, has preserved his desire to explore and continues to work on these ways to communicate. BERNARD QUENTIN was born in 1923 in Flamicourt (Picardie, France). After the Second World War he starts to produce works that have writing as basis, assuming that the ideal form to unite people is language. During his relentless quest to conceive universal signs, he comes to make monumental pieces, but also starts using original materials or tries to establish a real “semiology” of art. Passed away in June 2020, he will have never stopped creating throughout his life, and his participation in Art for All proves once again his dedication to designing works for everyone.
Philippe Hiquily
Born in Montmartre in 1925, Philippe Hiquily is a very singular artist, sculptor, but also creator of furniture, jewellery, etchings and experimental kinetic and electronic works. The main axis of his work is to play with shapes and balance but also the “coupling” of sculptures and objects. May they be in iron, brass or steel there are always principles behind his sculptures, art must be funny, playful and esthetical. Movements, curves and materials are as many ways to give life to metal that is metamorphosed in an erotic object. From New York to Paris, museums of tribal art to the salon of French aristocracy, this lover of women, protégé of Germaine Richier, friend of Arman, César, Jodorowsky or Alain Jouffroy, this very convivial and great cigar lover, Officer of the National Order of Arts and Letters, has always known, throughout his life, how to completely overwhelm our view of sculpture.
Francesco Marino Di Teana
Born amongst a family of peasants, Francesco Marino di Teana was successively a shepherd, a mason in Italy (Teana), site foreman, architect and student at the Art University of Argentina before moving to Paris in 1953. He was a painter, sculptor, architect, poet and philosopher and becomes one of the major sculptors of the 20th with his theories on “triunitarian” logic and architectural sculpture. Represented for more than 20 years by the mythical Denise René gallery and winner of prestigious artistic prizes, he was acclaimed by some of the greatest creators and art critics of his time. Precursor of the Monumenta’s at the Grand Palais with the exhibition of his monumental fountains (9 m high for 16 long), that he made with Saint-Gobain (Glass and industrial materials company), he has raised more than 40 monumental sculptures throughout France, one being the highest iron sculpture in Europe, “Liberté“ (Liberty), that is 20 meters high (at Fontenay-sous-bois). His lifetime work was the object of a retrospective in 1975 at the Paris Museum of Modern Arts, he represented Argentina at the Venice biennial of 1982, and won the academy of fine arts prize in 2009.
Philippe Druillet
With his well-known comic books Lone Sloane or Xcalibur, his participation to the iconic comic magazines Pilote or Humanoïdes Associés, the elaboration of 3D animation and even drawing and making entire film sets, Philippe Druillet (born in Toulouse in 1944) has pulled us into his own universe and opened new windows to the “9th art”. He is a unique author who will influence Jean Giraud in the evolution of his alter ego Moebius and Georges Lucas in the graphic conception of Star Wars. As a pioneer artist he is one of the milestones of our visual universe. A true genius of comic book making and a myth in the universe of science fiction, he is still today a great source of inspiration and a major influence to entire generations.
Quentin Garel
Born in Paris in 1975, Quentin Garel graduated from the Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris in 1998 and lived at Casa Velazquez (1998-2000). His work of sculpture, in bronze, iron, wood or porcelain, is characterized by the creation of a bestiary, sometimes very realistic, sometimes reduced to a state of skeleton. Garel explains: "In recent years, I have developed a sculpture work involving various wood assemblies around the theme of the trophy; proud custom of the man whom I try to divert in favor of the animals of consumption by denouncing the derisory character of this practice."
Wang Keping
Wang Keping is one of the most eminent members of Stars Art Group (xing xing 星星画会) , a foundational movement of the contemporary Chinese avant-garde active in the late 1970s and early 1980s. His wood sculptures blackened by fire and were firstly inspired by totem and by idols who reminded of folkloric tutelary figures in north of China and in Korean. Then his creation turned to the simple formes with the themes : women wearing a bun, kiss/couple, bird, masculine figures with tail, and a pair of teat. The simplification and purification were embodied in his sculptures, moreover, in the best cases reminded of Constantin Brancusi’s works.
Yazid Oulab
A thousand-facets artist with an ancestral soul Yazid Oulab seems to be nourished by centuries of civilizations. He is an interpreter and a messenger capable of analyzing and translating into simplified objects millennia of cultural, social and spiritual history. Son of a worker-mechanic-farmer father and a French teacher mother, Yazid Oulab is a real “storyteller. He is the accomplished artist, a man who, far from the excesses of today’s society, would always be ready to sacrifice his newly gained fame to art. He is a craftsman who is in love with the gesture, a fascinated and fascinating poet for whom the gaze generates meaning, a tireless witness and a potentially omniscient one. His works – objects, installations, sculptures and videos – represent tools of expression and communication that encourage us to consider the plurality of our times and measure the historical influence of all things.
Guillaume Piéchaud
Guillaume Piéchaud is a French sculptor and designer. Born in 1968, he graduated from the École Boulle (an historical reference amid art and design schools in Europe) in 1988, where he attended engraving techniques of precious metal. He has worked with famous jewelry designers for eight years, creating collections in collaboration with the most important craftsmen and luxury brands.
La Fratrie
Duo of artist-sculptors, composed of two brothers: Karim Berchiche born in 1978 in Le Quesnoy (Nord) & Luc Berchiche born in 1981 in Le Quesnoy (Nord) Currently live and work in Paris. Since their childhood, they have been creating fascinating sculptures with four hands, hence the choice of their artist's name, fascinating sculptures of precision and evocations that question the relationship between men and environment.