One of many reveals that opened as Juxtapoz was on an East Coast swing and specializing in the brand new reveals popping up in London and Paris was Genevieve Gaignard‘s Pondering Out Loud solo present that opened at Vielmetter. We featured Gaignard within the print magazine during the last yr and she or he was featured in our thirtieth anniversary works on paper present, I might Love To See You.
From the gallery:
Genevieve Gaignard is haunted. All of us are. Hauntings can tackle many types: reminiscences from childhood; the trauma that manifests from centuries of systemic racism; or the echoes of buddies and lovers, come-and-gone. In what is likely to be Gaignard’s most intimate physique of labor so far, Pondering Out Loud overlaps her apply along with her most up-to-date lived expertise, set in opposition to the backdrop of her newly located life in New York.
Pondering Out Loud signifies an evolution in Gaignard’s apply as she excavates ideas of id and displays on the intersections of life’s journey. Her symbol-laden, cryptic work speaks to bigger truths: the constructing and breaking down of partitions, the rupture of domesticity as wallpaper tears, and the detritus of on a regular basis life that we should all work our manner by means of. Gaignard explores the veil as armor, representing safety whereas shifting by means of progress. Her artwork transcends the non-public, changing into public by means of the artist’s intent, and challenges us to contemplate the importance of our personal tales inside the bigger context of humanity.
Pondering Out Loud invitations viewers to carefully contemplate open-ended questions that hang-out the intricacies of private relationships. Dreamscapes, depicted within the collages and the exhibition setting, grow to be fertile floor for exploring the emotional landscapes of affection and self-perception. Gaignard has described her working course of as a “lived playlist, a diaristic processing of my life, a artistic vibe set in opposition to the backdrop of combine tapes and private soundtracks that transcends, romanticizes, and offers an escape from the on a regular basis.”
In Lucid Lady (I’m Letting You Go), Gaignard casts herself as a ghostly determine, levitating in entrance of a swath of classic wallpaper. The title materialized throughout the artistic course of when she discovered sudden visual-sonic synchronicity within the lyrics of Thee Sacred Souls. One other “tune” on this playlist, the collage Gamers Solely Love You When They’re Playin’, is from Fleetwood Mac’s tune Desires. A younger Gaignard wields a wiffleball bat whereas navigating a sea of wallpapered baseball “gamers.” An arched textual content above her reads “ballbuster,” reclaiming and embracing the misogynistic insult as a badge of honor. She deconstructs her typically methodical working course of, revealing layers of wallpaper that present the disorienting multiplicity of areas.
In Angel and Muse, titled after a tune by Radamiz, Gaignard ruminates on the passage of time and creates a story about notion, reminiscence, and want. The work is a window into the artist’s inside life represented as a surreal avenue scene from her newly adopted borough of The Bronx. Gaignard herself is an observer inside the microcosm of exercise that surrounds her. An sudden, horny selfie of the artist might be discovered looking by means of a stained glass window, gazing at a disembodied arm orchestrating a flutter of butterflies.
In Tits for Tats, the artist gives a defiantly unadorned self-portrait, main viewers to surprise for whom the glistening picture was initially meant. She emerges by means of two torn layers of wallpaper, conjuring herself into non secular reduction. The tattoos that cowl her physique denote signifiers such because the biblical, the occult, and symbols of energy. Gaignard’s “third eye” means that enlightenment is feasible by means of self-acceptance and consciousness, whereas three anatomical hearts mystically orbit her crown.
True to the essence of Gaignard’s signature model, this physique of labor engages viewers with a poetic and nuanced dialogue that challenges them to see past the plain. Pondering Out Loud lifts the curtain on the complexities and struggles of on a regular basis life, highlighting the uncomfortable areas in between consciousness and the mysteries of our existence.