Edouard Levé — À propos — Slash Paris

“Photofit of an Elusive Infidel” (extract)

“Hypothesis: the works of Édouard Levé exhale/exalt the disturbing effect of a disappearance. A surreal atmosphere probing enigmatic absences. In Notes on the Cinematographer, Robert Bresson enjoined himself to “Apply myself to insignificant (non-significant) images” (1975). Common sense. Logic. Like the most uncertain openings. The doorway to a great desert, a long night or an endless journey. We need only recall certain images to feel their powerful siphon effect. An effect of suction. A kaleidoscope mechanism. Lying down on a sofa and remembering Levé’s images, his studio compositions and his daytime outdoor photos is a bit like closing your eyes, or boarding the train of your own fantasies and watching the scenery fly by. At other times one has the impression one is entering a maze. That is an effect of the serial images, and of the series of images.

Their titles are: Angoisse, Amérique, Pornographie, Quotidien, Rêves reconstitués, Rugby, Actualités, Fictions, Homonymes, Transferts. Of course, we will never find out what it was that was eclipsed, for these are works without a punch line, happy ending or any other kind of salutary and reassuring revelation. What or who has departed here, other than the meaning? Is it a person, an object, a feeling or only a form of power? The artist’s power. The artist’s power in relation to the dull, incessant noise of the media. The great reservoir of images. Silos, vats, abysses. The artist no longer controls the making of images. However, he does still control the differentiation of reading, deconstruction and laceration. Making media fragments disappear. Covering them with saliva or juice. Assimilating them to another body. Dissolving textures and combinations. Swallowing up spatio-temporal indicators. Spewing original arrangements. It is the great metabolism of contemporary artistic activity".