soft sculptures: A propos de l'exposition "The Garden Voice"

PRESS RELEASE ( & EXHIBITION CONCEPT)

«The Garden’s Voice» is an installation project in 6 parts or variations on the title theme by French artist Karine Jollet. This is also her first Swedish exhibition and we hope the first of many to come. Karine Jollet is a soft-sculpture artist using white fabrics as her favorite medium.

«The Garden’s Voice» is presented for the first time in this format which was specifically conceived for Fiberspace Gallery. The title is taken from a long poem by Haris Metaxa, «Possessed» written in the context of the joined garden Poetry-Sculpture Exhibition called «Bodies of Grace». The two artists, poet and sculptor, produced and exhibited it for the first time in 2009 in a Parisian garden, Nature being one of the Muses.

This installation includes the poem itself, declined in 15 suspended handkershiefs in pearl embroidery («Possessed»), a suspended human figure capturing the garden’s voice («Medium»), two suspended feet with roots («Dance»), a mini-installation of two sculptures combined, one of a tunic with lungs embroidered on it and the other of two feet firmly on the ground («Embodiment» and «Marcher - Walker»), a reclining woman connected to a flower («Rêve de Fleur - Flower Power») and a sculpture of a suspended human ear («Hearing»).

All installation sculptures are different characters of the same play, they exist in this invisible dimension where cosmic vibrations are transmitted and received and where Nature and Human beings are perceived and represented as Equal Entities sharing the same Cosmic Matrix.

Each group of sculptures and the whole installation as such bring to light a different aspect of this Harmonic Experience of being a part of the same Talking, Vibrating Cosmos.

Can you feel it ?

Thoughts about my sculptures

The body as an enigma, I explore it, step by step, like a space that I need to reconstruct, to unify.

Fabrics are materials that came naturally to me as an analogy to our own biological tissues: bones, fibers, crystals… I start with old bed sheets and shirts, embroidered handkerchieves and second-hand fabrics that I cut up, put the fragments together, pad them and then sew them by hand. In this way I reconstruct different body parts (arms, legs, heads) and several organs and bone structures.

Observing anatomy fills me with wonder and respect. In my eyes, there is nothing morbid in anatomy; I can only see beauty and the wonderful complexity of forms and of vital functions.

I cannot stop wondering, I ask myself, time after time, « why this hand, this foot, this heart …? ». Of what the body itself is a reflection?

Following this line of thought I find that anatomy possesses also a hidden dimension that connects us to an invisible, ideal order of things and also to a secret, dreamlike reality. To represent both, I use the preciosity of pearls and crystals, of lace and flowers, of animals and chimeras etc…

My sculptures are white to remind us of an invisible universe, far away from our own world, a dimension of unity and purity. White allows me also to connect all sculptures among themselves, to create a line of connection beyond the singularity of each work and recreate the complexity of the universe they remind of.

So, it can take the shape of a bone or the face of a goddess but all my sculptures are creatures of the same ideal universe where matter and spirit are in harmony.

KJ

A propos des sculptures

Le corps comme une énigme, je l’explore pas à pas, morceau par morceau, comme un espace à reconstruire, à unifier.

À partir de draps anciens, de vieilles chemises, de mouchoirs brodés... je découpe des pièces, les assemble, les modèle avec de la fibre polyester et les couds à la main.

Ces tissus deviennent alors une analogie de l’enveloppe corporelle, des tissus biologiques : osseux, fibreux, cristallins…

À travers la couture s’opère une reconstitution des membres (bras, jambes, têtes) et des différents organes et ossements.

L’observation de l’anatomie m’inspire de l’émerveillement et du respect ; au lieu de la morbidité, j’y vois la beauté et l’ingéniosité des formes et des processus vitaux.

Sans cesse je me demande : Qu’est-ce que cette main, ce pied, ce coeur...? Que reflète le corps?

C’est alors que l’anatomie me renvoit à un ordre idéal et à une dimension onirique, que je traduis par la préciosité de cristaux de perles, des dentelles de fleurs, par des formes d’animaux et de chimères...

Mes sculptures sont blanches, car le blanc évoque un univers au-delà du visible, au-delà du vivant, un espace d’unité et de pureté. Le blanc est comme une base sur laquelle toutes ces sculptures peuvent être reliée entre elles.

Que ce soit un os ou le visage d’une déesse, ces sculptures appartiennent à un même univers idéal, où la matière et l’esprit s’harmonisent.