Vernissage: January 16th from 3 to 6 PM. The artist will be present.
Palette de peintre, 2015-2016
Bois et peinture acrylique
Wood and acrylic paint
40,5 x 86 x 30,5 cm (16’’x 34’’ x 12’’)
Les appelants
David Lafrance opens our 2016 season at Galerie Hugues Charbonneau with an exhibition of polychrome wood sculptures. This body of work marks Lafrance’s renewed approach to working with three-dimensional objects and their painted surfaces which activate key concepts in his artistic practice: memory, popular culture and desire.
Les appelants refers to artificial lures, traditionally crafted out of wood and used by hunters to attract wild birds. These decoys act as catalysts; their mere presence is enough to attract other birds. Lafrance’s interest in this concept can be linked to his previous painting series, namely Clubs, Video Poker and Ventilateurs, where places and effigies give tangible form to today’s incessant quest for pleasure and (over)consumption.
The exhibition Les appelants brings together sculptures whose forms are hewn, then assembled and painted. They refer in a grotesque way to objects either found in the artist’s studio, or that relate to current events. The works seamlessly combine rough textures with graceful curves that reinvent, even re-enchant, the everyday. Moving through this colourful collection in the gallery, our desires are given form, and our hopes for the future, our anxieties and our vices, are laid bare. These are allegories, hyphens between our selves and the exterior world; these objects draw us in, as if possessed by certain truths or clues to our relationship with the world, like sirens who both seduce us and warn us of imminent danger.
Meditéranée, 2015-2016
Bois et peinture acrylique
Wood and acrylic paint
61 x 48 x 35,5 cm (24’’x 19’’ x 14’’)
David Lafrance
For nearly 15 years, David Lafrance’s (b. 1976) work has been presented in numerous exhibitions and biennales in Canada, the US, and in France. Among his recent solo exhibitions are Ceaac (2015), Strasbourg; Galerie Hugues Charbonneau (2014); L’Œil de Poisson (2014), Québec City; and the Musée régional de Rimouski (2012), which won the prize for “Best exhibition outside of Montréal” at the AGAC’s Gala des arts visuels. His works are part of several private and public collections, including the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec (CPOA), the Bibliothèque nationale du Québec; the Leonard and Bina Ellen Art Gallery, Montréal; Lotto Québec; Hydro-Québec; and Movement Desjardins. He lives and works in Montréal.
