Website: www.guillaumeclermont.org
Works at: Seoul Art Space_GeumCheon
Stays in: 2014
2010-2014 M.A.
– Visual arts Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM), Montréal,
Canada
2004-2007 B.A.
– Visual arts, International profile Université Laval, Québec city, Canada
2003 Studies in
Comparative Literature and Philosophy Université de Montréal,
Canada
Selected Solo Exhibitions
2014 (upcoming exhibition) Galerie Nivet-Carzon,
Paris, France
2013 The Rabbit Box (Don Quixote’s Dilemma) The Bunker (NDSM Treehouse), Amsterdam,
Netherlands
Cache-cache (Black Box)Galerie Le 36,
Québec city, Canada
2012 Cheshire Grin
(Montrer les dents) Galerie Lilian Rodriguez, Montréal,
Canada
2011 Warehouse (les
Jardins) Glendon Gallery, York University, Toronto,
Canada
2009 Baglady (ou la
grosse poche pleine de fleurs) Circa centre d’exposition art contemporain,
Montréal, Canada
Selected Group Exhibitions
2014 Down the Magic MountainMedia Art in Seoul Soul (Hal 할 project), Seoul,
South Korea
Antiquités
contemporaines STAND 124, Marché
Dauphine, Paris, France
Moonwalkers
– curators Paul Brunet, Guillaume
Clermont and Mathieu Lévesque Galerie
Trois Points, Montréal, Canada
2013 Une grande passion partagée: un flirt avec la jeune
peinture Galerie Lilian Rodriguez,
Montréal, Canada
Salon du
printemps des artistes des Cantons-de-l'EstMusée des beaux-arts de Sherbrooke,
Canada
2012 Sans feu ni lieu
Maison vide, Crugny, France
While supplies last –
curators Alexandre Jimenez, Maud Marique and Vincent Routhier Galerie B-312, Montréal,
Canada
2011 On n’attache
pas son chien avec de la saucisse – curator Romain Boulay MPVite, Nantes,
France
L'éphémère: Fugacité
et permanence en art contemporain Galerie Lilian Rodriguez, Montréal,
Canada
Compossibilité(s) –
curator Paul BrunetGalerie
Laroche/Joncas, Montréal, Canada
Residencies
2013 Residency with
exhibition (one
month)NDSM Treehouse, Amsterdam,
Netherlands
2012 Residency with
exhibition (one
month)Maison Vide, Crugny,
France
Curator residency
(ten days) A3000 and H.C Waldschütz Stiftung, Leipzig,
Germany
2011 Residency with
exhibition (one
month)MPVite, Nantes,
France
2009 Programme de
soutien à la production (one month residency) Œil de Poisson, Québec city,
Canada
2008-2009 Résidences
Croisées France-Québec (three months residency) Point Éphémère, Paris,
France
Sans
titre,
2009
Carnets
d'errance (Dislocations), Bologna,
Italy, 2012
Carnets
d'errance (Dislocations), Paris,
France, 2014
No
man's land,
HD video, 5:22, 2010
Sans
titre (Hendaye),
video still, 2010
Sans
titre,
Galerie Lilian Rodgriguez, 2013
Sans
titre,
acrylic on canvas, 30 x 30 cm, 2009-2013
Warehouse
II (Totem),
installation, 2013
Warehouse
II (Totem),
detail, 2013
Warehouse
II (Totem),
detail, 2013
Dislocation
Kim Hae Ju, Independent Curator
Guillaume Clermont’s skull is the motif
which is repeated throughout his work like the signature that represents the
artist. He has been painting skulls for 10 long years on canvases of the same
size. The motif which was derived from a Flemish painting from the 16th
century, is a reminder of death and at the same time, makes us think of a state
deviated from the normal state as the jawbone is dislocated from the cranium.
It may be in a worn-down condition because of age, was excavated by an
archaeologist and dusted off, or it has a dislocated form due to some sort of
external shock. The skulls are transformed innumerable times against various
backgrounds of different colors and forms. Some display cartoon-like forms
within a stark contrast of vivid colors and some are painted in familiar arrangements
of shapes and colors by adopting the styles of historic arts. Amidst the
endless repetition, the dislocated skull of the 16th Century gets
mixed up with contemporary icons. The dislocated skulls are left in distorted
places. The artist puts the paintings in his bag and leaves them at a corner of
a street, in front of a billboard, at a café, at a metro station, or at the
base of a tree trunk in different cities. These are not places where people
normally expect to find a painting, and as such, that unfamiliarity makes us
question the fixed and conventional ideas we have in terms of the painting
display. The areas that raise this question become the ideal spot for the
artist’s paintings. Passersby suddenly become viewers of the paintings and some
people might even take the paintings home. There could also be a painting which
fails to draw attention and is left in the same place for a long time. The
questions the dislocated skull poses are diverse; can a painting be judged good
or bad? Can a painting in an exhibition hall be judged differently from a
painting on the streets in terms of value? Even if paintings are placed on the
streets, they are different from abandoned objects. The classical form they
have makes people easily recognize that they are a specific form of art. In
fact, the way the artist randomly disperses his paintings in the real world
just as if uploading images easily on web can be seen as a resistance against
the disappearance of images. This portrays the belief that the analog form of a
painting will make it sustain its life. The image of a skull here is
paradoxically linked to the impossibility of death. Although the artist does
not trace his paintings’ whereabouts, he hears rumors about them. Distorted time
meets distorted place and lost time "temps perdu" meets lost teeth
"dents perdues". Teeth worn-down over time and lost from the skull
are another motif in the artist’s painting. The grin of a Cheshire cat created
by Lewis Carroll hangs in the air even after the image of the cat disappears.
The image of what’s left after its disappearance, the colors on the canvas
which resemble sparse arrangement of teeth exhibit the grin of the Cheshire
cat. They speak about something that continuously extends, something that has
already disappeared yet does not cease to disappear. The artist born in Canada
and currently living in Belgium has spent 3 months in Seoul. As much as the motif
of the skull, dislocation provides much inspiration to the artist. Holding numerous
canvases in his arms, the artist traveled afar to Seoul, drew paintings of
skulls, left them on the streets and made installation artworks using cardboard
boxes, which are also one of his motifs. The artist’s studio I visited a few
days prior to his departure was still full of skull paintings. What rhythm will
his continuing dislocation add on the variation of these distorted images? Will
the spatial differences between the cities he had been living in or time
differences find their chance to be reflected in the story or the structure of
his painting?
