MARC DESGRANDCHAMPS

As often in Marc Desgrandchamps’ canvases, the situations offered to the viewer reveal a kind of porosity of space—one that opens onto other dimensions and other realities. For the artist, the sensation of time is enveloping rather than linear, producing temporal harmonies and dissonances that gently unsettle the gaze. Places and times mingle, much like the blending of colors.

A sense of fragility and disappearance emerges from certain canvases, like the day after an invisible catastrophe. Something has taken place, though no one can describe it. What remain are mirrored figures, confronting themselves and their solitude—survivors standing against the horizon, or even towering above it with their full presence (“Souvenir d’éléphant”).

Beyond this density of time, painting also conveys the fleetingness of the instant: a moment when a ray of sunlight illuminates a cliff or the surface of water, and painting seeks to capture it. In the artist’s usual practice, this process involves a long maturation beginning with a photograph and unfolding on canvas through successive layers and back-and-forth reworkings. Several days, sometimes weeks, are needed to reach a “definitive” state. In this exhibition, Marc Desgrandchamps presents for the first time a small group of “one-day” paintings, executed in a single movement. The canvas ground is left bare, and from it new and unsettling compositions that open pathways to understanding the artist’s process.

Also on view are new prints published by Galerie Lelong, including one in several variants enhanced with gouache.

Born in 1960, Marc Desgrandchamps lives and works in Lyon. His work has been exhibited in numerous prestigious institutions, including the Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris (2011), the MNAM – Centre Georges Pompidou (2006), and the Kunstmuseum Bonn (2005). In 2023, his work was the subject of a retrospective at the Musée d’Art Contemporain de Marseille and then at the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon, accompanied by a catalogue published by Skira. His works are represented in many French public collections, including: Frac Île-de-France – Le Plateau; Frac Occitanie Toulouse – Les Abattoirs; Musée d’Art Contemporain de Lyon; Musée d’Art Moderne et Contemporain des Sables d’Olonne; Musée des Beaux-Arts de Caen; Musée d’Art Moderne et Contemporain de Strasbourg; Centre national des arts plastiques (CNAP).