On September 27, 2003, I put up a very brief exhibition for the duration of the live model workship, that’s to say two-and-a-half hours. I exhibit 22 oil paintings of 45 x 32 on 130g Arctic Hafreström paper, from sketched made in this workshop and finished quickly at home.
I make a sign, the stupidest there ever was, that I put up just at the beginning of the exhibition, because so often the signs are better than the canvases exhibited. In this way, my oil paintings are much better than the sign. I exhibit myself. The sign is so repulsive that I see people turning around without saying a thing and without advancing further.
I worked with a reduced palette. The purpose is to bring out something other than beautiful nudes that sweat workshop and conformity. In this place of dispute, where, catalogued as such, I find that academicism is sometimes more academic than the king.
World conflicts are intensifying, the artists of la Brèche, from the source, the devils, and the street, the GIGN in the clock tower share the buildings of these former barracks. I try to put a bit of this there.
This is a provocation on my part and these are assertions: around a model there is a near and far environment, the world extends beyond the doors of a studio. But in the minds of the students and model, there is only the pose. It is a call to other students to take risks, to appropriate places in a broad sense, by affirmation, action, by taking up a position.
It is a reminder of the imperfection that is ours, that is mine ; it is a reminder of the ephemeral exhibitions and the actions of which I am fond.