Le Grand Dérangement/The Big Clean-Up

Open Studio is pleased to present Le Grand Dérangement/The Big Clean-Up, an exhibition by Montreal-based artists Guillaume Brisson-Darveau & Pascaline Knight from January 10 – February 15, 2014. The exhibition is accompanied by a text by Montreal-based artist, Caroline Cloutier.

Le Grand Dérangement/The Big Clean-Up borrows from the visual code of construction sites, utilizing a megalomaniacal overproduction in order to speak of the increasing speed at which things are destroyed and built in the name of development. Printed primarily on Tyvek® HomeWrap® – a widely used building material that prevents weather-related damages – the installation becomes a metaphor for our collective impermeability towards each other.

Guillaume Brisson-Darveau & Pascaline Knight build on an experimental practice combining screenprinting, intervention and installation work. Pascaline Knight holds a Bachelors degree in Studio Art from Concordia University (1996) and Guillaume Brisson-Darveau holds a Masters Degree from University Laval (2011). As a duo, they have exhibited primarily in Montréal, notably at ARPRIM, Diagonale Gallery and Atelier Graff. Brisson-Darveau and Knight have been working together creatively for more than three years, primarily using screenprint, sculpture and video, where scale, colour and motif play a central role. They often stage themselves in their installations to challenge preconceived social, cultural, gender or situational perceptions. Through their creative process, they sample their surroundings to create new personal semantic spaces that are then adapted to the gallery space at hand. The artists perceive the use of their bodies as a malleable material by elaborating, fragmenting and camouflaging to re-invent social interactions, rituals. They make fake things to hide real things, which paradoxically reveal them. Their work is fun and humorous although there is an underlying gravity, that always returns to their physicality and humanity.

Download a PDF of the exhibition brochure with accompanying essay and full artist and author biographies below. Le texte est aussi disponible en français.

Exhibition Brochure: Download Brochure Here