Une trace ineffaçable n’est pas une trace

-Gallery II-

Une trace ineffaçable n’est pas une trace

In her exhibition Une trace ineffaçable n’est pas une trace, Chloë Charce adds another dimension to her sculptural practice and pays homage to architecture. This long-term research took root during a residency in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 2018, where the portals of the Chacarita Cemetery inspired the artist to develop thought-provoking life-size replicas. The result of this project was the exhibition presences. mémoires d’architecture (2018), presented at the artist-run center AXENÉO7 (Gatineau). Taken out of context, the ghostly doors told the story of a city ex situ, instilling the dichotomy of the unknown, giving the objects an enigmatic allure. Several projects followed in which Charce tirelessly immersed herself in the architecture of cities and almost obsessively reconstructed them, metaphorically sublimating their appearance, to give them the continuity of an ornamental imaginary world, yet inscribed in the temporality of an exhibition. Little by little, the alienation of movement has altered the usual form of the buildings, giving them an abstract look, conferring the supernatural aura observable in Dénouer les embâcles (produced during a creative residency at Atelier Silex, Trois-Rivières, in 2021-2022), the project formally closest to the current exhibition.

In Une trace ineffaçable n’est pas une trace, the artist explores the imaginary dimension of architecture, evoking lost worlds – fantasized – such as Atlantis. Appearing like a glacier or even that of crystallized water, the wooden structures seem to make reference to the elements, but also give a nod to the place where they were made and are now exhibited. The seemingly abstruse geometric forms are in fact a reference to the deconstruction of architectural elements. Thus Charce mixes the concept of a built heritage with that of the imagination. She also plays with the codes known as facadism, which consist in keeping only the frontage of a building to give the illusion of its ornamental appearance, removing its first purely utilitarian use. With this device, the artist questions the durability and memory of architecture when its aesthetics is considered antiquated.

The lighting in the installation magnifies the geometrical forms and the cutout patterns, making them appear as fragments, like a breath sowing the confusion on the living aspect of a monument. Une trace ineffaçable n’est pas une trace is a controlled luminous journey, an immersive installation in which the back and front of the work merge. The living alters the boundary of the built. “Chloë Charce thwarts the gaze and perceptions, creates decoys, transforms and subtly diverts the real through improbable relations between the pieces. […] These ghostly palimpsests (re)draw the landscape of the gallery that has become a giant canvas, magnifying the space through the transmutation of unusual elements.” The artist only reveals what she wants about her work, when she sees it is useful, thus offering the viewing public the impermanent trace of forms sometimes positive, other times negative, never completely tangible, erased and reappearing endlessly. Taken from a work of Jacques Derrida , the exhibition title is meant to be interrogatory: is an ineffaceable trace a trace? And vice versa, can a trace be erased, since it impregnates the retina, and transforms it into a memory? A trace that is erased is memory.

– Lucile Godet

Author Biography
Lucile Godet has lived and worked between Gatineau and Ottawa for several years. Originally from Nantes, France, her involvement in Hull’s cultural milieu began during her exchange year at the UQO’s Master of Museology program (2016). She holds a Master’s degree in Arts and Culture Management (Paris 1 – Panthéon Sorbonne). Curious by nature, Lucile is a jack of all trades. In her professional career, she has had the opportunity to work in the conservation and logistics of artworks, the promotion of the pan-Canadian Francophonie and on the principles of governance for community organizations. Lucile Godet is also a freelance writer and a certified yoga teacher. She is personally committed to inclusion, diversity and equity for all.

Artist Biography
Chloë Charce is a visual artist who lives and works in the Laurentians and in Montreal. Her multidisciplinary practice encompasses sculpture, photography, video and installation. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Visual and Media Arts from Université du Québec à Montréal and a Master’s degree in Studio Arts from Concordia University (sculpture concentration). She has received several awards and grants and has participated in various events, residencies and exhibitions, notably in Canada and Argentina. In 2022, she was part of a two-person exhibition at Occurrence with Véronique Chagnon Côté. In 2021, she was invited to a creative residency at Atelier Silex, in Trois-Rivières.

She is interested in different issues, notably the notions of disappearance, temporality and memory. Posing her gaze on the interstices, the off-camera, her works are often presented as metonymic fragments of reality: bits of sky, vestiges of architecture, utopian landscapes made of glass objects.

The artist thanks the Canada Council for the Arts, Atelier Silex, iScan 3D (Richard Lapointe), Lazzit (Jean-Sébastien Delisle), Usimm, as well as Émilie Allard, Tyna Awad, Ghislain Brodeur, Frédéric Chabot, Véronique Chagnon Côté, Martin Giguère, Caroline Pacchiella and Myriam Simard Parent.

Photo credit : Jean-Michael Seminaro