SARLA VOYER / EXHIBITION / MÉMORIAL

Opening reception : Thursday, June 2, 2011

17h

Designed in the spirit of architectural games, MÉMORIAL is an in situ sculptural installation that unfolds on the floor of Sporobole in order to inscribe the plan of a fictional city seen as the crow flies. The project, which is both a collection and a collection project, is evolving. Thus, an urban sketch based on a collection of discarded objects moulded in plaster takes the form of a singular path, which transforms the exhibition space into a place of stroll.

Sarla Voyer’s works echo recent practices of a sculptural or installation nature that focus on the renewed staging of a certain evocation of the city, by proposing modular assemblies, model-scale constructions, or configurations of several elements displayed on a display case. The artist offers here a minimalist topography within a circuit made up of various polyhedra with the appearance of familiar, vaguely recognizable packaging, which imposes itself as reduced architectures.

These elements are placed on the ground in a configuration that suggests futuristic or totalitarian urban development, from which humans are absent, their presence not appearing desirable. Favouring the panoptic gaze, the simple and meticulous arrangement of elements standardized by the white of the plaster, grouped by models or stacked, creates a definite visual impact, like an imposing mosaic that one would try to decipher.

Without engaging in the recollection of a site, nor in the criticism of urbanization or consumption, this installation gives us a space where objects multiply to create a place of fabulous character, which invites us to contemplate while bearing the imprint of a certain poetry of ruin.

Sarla Voyer’s sculpture and installation work calls on the potential of evocative familiar objects. The notion of place is materialized through the staging of these objects assembled or transformed in such a way as to form imaginary territories. References to landscape and architecture shape these proposals, which demonstrate an attachment to the theme of housing.

Crédit photo : Jocelyn Riendeau