Grégory Cuquel — From beyond — Olivier Robert Gallery — Exhibition — Slash Paris

Past: June 21 → July 28, 2012

Galerie Olivier Robert announces From Beyond, Gregory Cuquel’s first solo exhibition.

The title From Beyond was chosen by the artist in reference to the American death metal band called Massacre and it reflects his approach pretty well : one the one hand, by the private world of the teenager’s bedroom formally and culturally transcribed through the artworks, on the other hand, by a reflection on the production of art itself. The artist’s approach acts metaphorically on its production: he develops his art from items that nobody wants, but as they are transformed into art — both by the will of the artist and their exhibition in places dedicated to art, as Marcel Duchamp had declared — these items are brought into another life. Once acquired by a collector or institution, these combinations of materials that no one wanted become the objects of much attention and care, receiving specific conservation efforts and thus embracing a new destiny. They “had a close shave” and are brought to last.

Gregory Cuquel not only recycles but he also recreates an aesthetic of the ruin. He assumes/indorses the aesthetics of decay in all its roughness, far from any romantic interpretation.