Grande Ourse

Painting, or looking at the night sky, throws us towards the unknown. Like the Great Bear, painting sets us in motion — the body moved by the eye.

My process begins by opening a space. Unrolling a length of paper, unfolding a tarpaulin to make a surface. Once it is on the floor, that surface becomes a territory I enter: an expanse to be covered. As in walking, the movement is carried by rhythm, touch and repetition. The time of the work is the time my hand needs to take in that territory.

The paint, supple and fluid, catches the imprint, the impulse and the intention. When I reach the end of the movement I leave, and the canvas is alone. Like a note that goes on sounding, it lives by itself. The material passes gradually from fluid to solid. What was a wave becomes a memory with thickness, a trace of the passage. That memory is reactivated when the canvas faces the viewer. It vibrates in the space and invites the viewer into an experience of painting.

Alexandre Clanis

An exhibition supported by Château Desmirail.