SWIZ – April, 20 > May, 15 2018
The french artist presents his second solo show » OPEN SYSTEM « at the David Bloch Gallery. He exhibits a new series of works – paintings and bas-reliefs.
Swiz is a french artist born in 1983. He lives and works in Paris.
Following from Swiz’s first exhibition at the David Bloch Gallery « CHAOS CONTROL » in 2016, in which the artist aimed to find a balance in density, » OPEN SYSTEM « refers to a process which particularity is to interact permanently with its environment.
The works presented here appear as free interpretations of Swiz’s environment, from his workspace and the gray Parisian winter to the Kasbah during the Moroccan spring with its red ocher walls. All reinterpreted through the prism of shapes and colors. Constructions and architectures are injected here to compose a hybrid language, applying a mathematical rigor in the deconstruction and the retranscription of those informations. The suppression of functionalism allows the artist to extract a formal register from his environment that enables to create new spaces, where classical constructions give way to a complex and dynamic geometry.
The work on canvas reveals territories with fragmented volumes, sliced clearly by radical lines. The metallic structures elaborate layers, inviting the spectator to a circulation by moving in front of the works to make their way, to perceive the hidden or invisible parts, the half-opened doors. They are designed with the aim of generating new underground spaces based on the notion of covering. The hollowed-out volumes reveal as much as they hide. Each piece can then be perceived as a track, the element of an imaginary map to be deciphered.
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« Swiz raises structures, which intricacy, sometimes barely suggested, prompts our senses. Perception is steered by chromatic compositions created without an inch being left to chance. » …
« Color is the founding dimension of the artwork. It presents itself in a plurality of matching hues, following a score just as well-planned. Games on transparencies create an harmony which can only be born from these relationships: they can be complementary, blending in, contrasted. Whichever they are, the legitimacy of the coordinations reflects the acute and sophisticated eye of the artist.
The framework keeps evolving. It comes to shape, comes to life, is even unbuilt sometimes, to draw up a new plan, whereas the course remains unchanged. It is a matter of putting together “the” combination, the one that will reveal, beyond the shapes and letters, the subliminal feeling of equilibrium and true accuracy. » .. . « A hybrid language, as if to deliver intimacy with decency, to delicately relay what is essential and hidden behind the structure.
The emotions lie beneath. They condition the production, define its essence and exacerbate its impact. Anchoring the sensitive totally fits the territory concept and comes out in his urban in-situ practice. Places sanctuarized by oblivion, that he occupies for their emotional charge, the soul of a long-gone past, of an outdated swarm, which indelible energy becomes creative. This aesthetics of disrepair can be tamed into an inspiring potentiality, which becomes the stage of multi-material and colourful staging. The wood assemblies find in it a relevant resonance to found structures in adequacy with their in-situ use, which he takes time to model, away from the indiscrete eyes. »
Text from Caroline Ruggeri / Urbanity
«The strictly contemplative dimension of abstract painting does not interest me. Shapes and colors are not self-sufficient. That’s why I keep a structure, either alphabetical, architectural, figurative or not. This structure must not be too restrictive or tyrannical and make way for wandering. …. During my travel, I realized the importance of getting lost. I was struck by how people, have their eyes on a map or a guide, when they discover a place, frightened by the idea that at some point they might not know where they are or how to return to their starting point, so reassuring since known. On the contrary, I always have naturally tended towards wandering, which gives way to discovery, the unknown, and confronts us with our emotions. No doubt it is necessary to lose oneself in order to find »….« Also, my paintings invite the viewer to go astray, to make his own way or to discover the words that may be there. But I do not try to let the viewer completely lost in an inextricable situation, a geometric structure appears clearly enough for him to “advance”. In my case, this structure is quite similar to those of cities as we know them in the West. »
Interview between SWIZ and Caroline Ruggeri / Urbanity
«Is it the disorder of abandoned places that finally gave him this need for organization, or rather the desire to give meaning to his work in the logic of mathematical forms, or even mathematical words »…«The geometry of its support would then be the consequence of its wanderings. All these rooms so often invested by the artist, like boxes that open and unfold, position him in a game of “geo localization”: I AM HERE. And as a clever game of facets, one just have to linger a bit on a piece to find the combination and decrypt the message.»
Text from Florent Perrigault