Landschap van gras met glitches en digitale bewerkingen.

Jean-Vincent Simonet, 2014

Maldoror #2

Created by Jean-Vincent Simonet in 2014. The artwork is an inkjet print and displayed at 90 x 120 cm.

When Jean-Vincent Simonet chanced upon the book Les Chants de Maldoror (The Songs of Maldoror), he felt hugely attracted to its dark, theatrical, repulsive character. This avant-garde book, written in 1869 by the French poet Comte de Lautréamont, is an ode to the rebelliousness of youth, blasphemy, and the triumph of dreams over reality. Simonet decided to breathe new life into this literary mystery. His photographs are based on the atmosphere conjured up in the book: gothic angels framed against an overwhelming and digitally enhanced blue starry sky; dead branches that melt into pink and blue shapes and call to mind plucks of hair. The eclectic style inspired Simonet to use both analogue and digital photography, applying digital techniques to distort and blend together photographs. As a result, the book’s mysterious atmosphere becomes palpable in the images. It will likely not come as a surprise to learn that this book was once banned on account of its blasphemous character.

© Jean-Vincent Simonet, courtesy of the Foam Collection

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Maldoror #2