JON ERIC RIIS / MARCEL MAROIS - MEN AT THE LOOM
These artists use a process specific to metamorphosis: the detour and appropriation of images. Jon Eric Riis, for this exhibition, has focused mainly on the figure of Man, while Marcel Marois remains very attentive to nature.
The work of Jon Eric Riis abounds in references to the Myths and Ideals of the cultures of the past. As for example with Young Icarus and this elegant male silhouette from the back, with wings taken up next to it and woven in 3 dimensions. The artist also creates a typical garment whose slightly flared silhouette, with wide sleeves, becomes a short coat or jacket that is not meant to be worn. The middle opening of the garment allows for the discovery of a possible interior decoration. In Asia, clothing is much more than a fashion phenomenon: it materializes social or religious belonging. A sort of symbolic world that can be worn, it always carries a message, as shown, for example, by the Ancestors’ coat, woven especially for the exhibition and still being woven. The outside is decorated with human faces, without hair, faces that are not stereotyped but almost interchangeable! The artist is aware of the strong symbolism of clothing in different cultures and at all times. He plays with the hidden/revealed and highlights a game between the inside and the outside. He surprises us by revealing a message…here, the interior takes the head of a monkey, the ancestor of Man!
As for Marcel Marois, these recent tapestries are more and more abstract, there is an almost total erasure of all naturalistic traces. However, the iconography at its source, comes from the pixilation of an image, often extracted from the local press, evoking for example beached whales, seals… then deformed by the repeated passages to the photocopier and thereafter, to weaving. But the referents are progressively erased by the geometrical forms, as for example in the tapestry Double Horizons or still with Averse Chromatique. These metaphors evoke the necessity of environmental commitment, the urgency of renouncing a nature that would only be ornamental. By weaving his own visual universe, the artist takes a vigilant look at our fragile world, at this vital nature. On the frame of History, he fixes the irreversible alteration of the world
