Denis Savary, Blood on the Dining-Room Floor, video, sound, 8’53”, loop, 2024
Blood on the Dining-Room Floor borrows its title to Gertrude Stein’s first detective novel, written after the successful Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas. As she lived recluse with her partner, Alice, in the French village of Bilignin, Stein started writing this novel, inspired by the various events and intrigues of the small hamlet daily life. Her country house then becomes a location from which Stein could observe this microcosm filled with underlying violence. With this video, Savary looks back to a specific period in his work, in the beginning of the 2000s, when he was producing videos mostly from or within the immediate environment of his family home in Vaud. Realized in miniDV, a bygone production mean, these videos represent an era where the house worked as a studio and as a vantage point overlooking the world. Curiously, amongst the miniature houses of the Villa series, the one chosen for Blood on the Dining-Room Floor is the one which looks the most similar to the artist’s old house.
The video is accompanied by an eponym sound piece, a work commissioned to the artists composers Maria Esteves and Mathilde Hansen. The sound and the image are merged and seem to be out of sync, as a dance off the beat. Progressively, the house’s motion slows down, and reveals the complexity of a mutli-track House sound from which emerges a voice that chants extract from Gertrude Stein’s novel. The video dissimulates a pun, between the musical genre of House music and the main subject of the film, the artist’s childhood house. Set in a rotating movement, the miniature house from the Blood on the Dining-Room Floor video reminds of dance-floor disco balls projecting rays of colored light.
Denis Savary (1981) lives and works in Geneva. His work has been shown in a number of solo exhibitions, such as : Josy’s Club, with Pierre-Olivier Arnaud, Synagogue de Delme, Delme (2023) ; Octogone, avec Chloé Delarue, Mayday, Basel (2023) ; Flower of Fog, GNYP Gallery, Berlin (2022) ; Ithaca, Galerie Maria Bernheim, Zurich (2021) ; Ambarabà Cicci Cocco, with Alfredo Aceto, Stiftung Kunsthalle Sankt Gallen, Saint Gall (2021) ; Ventimiglia, Galerie Maria Bernheim, London (2021); Phantom, Lemme, Sion (2021). His many recent group exhibitions include : Temps de Mars, Musée des Beaux-Arts, La Chaux-de-Fonds (2024) ; The Big Chill, Galerie Maria Bernheim, London (2023) ; Mirage, MCBA, Lausanne (2023) ; Deep Deep Down, MUDAM Luxembourg, Luxembourg (2023) ; The Puppet Show, Centre d’art contemporain, Geneva (2022) ; Inventaire, Mamco, Geneva (2021) ; Ballard in Albisola, Casa Jorn House, Albisola (2021) ; La Suite – Regards sur les artistes des collections des Frac, Institut d’art contemporain, Villeurbanne (2021) ; Body Double, Galerie Maria Bernheim, London (2021). In 2024, Denis Savary’s work will be the subject of several solo and group exhibitions: Fonderia Artistica Battaglia, Milan ; Denis Savary, Galerie Maria Bernheim, London ; Roma, Roma, Roma, Rolex Learning Center, Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne. In 2025, he will be exhibited at KBCB Kunsthaus Biel Centre d’art, Biel.
This project is supported by Ernst und Olga Gubler-Hablützel Foundation, Leenaards Foundation and the Office fédérale de la culture, de la République et canton de Genève.
Caroline Schattling Villeval, When a frog meets a dog, animation video, loop, 5′, 2024
At the bottom of an almost dry lake, frogs are gathered around a puddle. Their movements, slowed down and almost imperceptible, bring life to this deserted landscape. A dog appears. Imposing, his body extends beyond the frame. His walk sets off a panoramic, moving shot.
Thus begins Caroline Schattling Villeval’s video When a frog meets a dog, produced for her exhibition Carences et toute-puissance1. This new piece functions as a continuation of her installation good boy (Hasch, Marseille, 2023) which revolved around the fictional text Vie/Chienne, that explores the question of domination arising from a non-consensual interaction between a person and a dog with a wandering tongue2. Once again, the animal is one of the main protagonists of Caroline Schattling Villeval’s video When a frog meets a dog, this time alongside a group of frogs.
With his massive, slender body and golden fur, the dog, animated by Caroline Schattling Villeval, moves forward in a menacing manner. He appears to be indifferent to everything, including the amphibians which have come together to stop his march. Piled up in the shape of a column, they form a mass in front of this manifestation of almighty power. The counter-power embodied in the group’s strength is swept away, pushed aside by a paw. It’s not strong enough. A crushing failure even: it’s raining frogs. They splash into the exhibition space, contaminating the room. The almighty power triumphs over the collective strength. End of the story. However, in Caroline Schattling Villeval’s work, the power dynamics also manifest themselves in an underlying manner through the technical process. A dog, frogs, a 3D-modelled bestiary bought online like one would adopt a pet: an act of domination. Then comes the computer, far from functioning autonomously as the artist manipulates her virtual puppets through an animation software. Finally, the dog, never fully visible, dominates the frogs as well as the space. The dog, the first animal species domesticated by Man – its « best friend » –, that Caroline Schattling Villeval has trained to perform its own dance. The image is replayed in a loop, but who’s calling the shots? When a frog meets a dog is a canvas onto which power dynamics are superimposed in infinite layers.
1. In parallel with her exhibition at the Centre d’édition contemporaine, Caroline Schattling Villeval presents StéréoMimicryat the Salle Crosnier, Palais de l’Athénée, from January 12 to February 10, 2024. 2. Vie/Chienne was written by Caroline Schattling Villeval in 2023 for [SWISS] Weird & Magic #1, forthcoming publication by éditions Clinamen.
Born in 1995 in Zürich, Caroline Schattling Villeval lives and works in Geneva. Her work has been exhibited in various venues in Switzerland and abroad in solo shows such as : StéréoMimicry, Salle Crosnier, Geneva (12.01–10.02.2024) ; good boy, Hasch, Marseille (2023) ; No firing, with Paul Paillet, Espace 3353, Carouge (2021) ; Chiara Chiara Chiara, Zabriskie Point, Geneva (2020) ; Being fucked, Lokal-int, Biel (2020). She has also taken part in several group exhibitions, including: Basel Social Club with Joyfully waiting, Basel (2023) ; MINIMIRACLES, Sonnenstube, Lugano (2023) ; Bourses déliées – Arts Visuels, Halle Nord, Geneva (2022); Prix Kiefer Hablitzel, Art Basel, Basel (2022) Esprit d’Escalier, with Paul Paillet, Centre d’édition contemporaine, Geneva (2022) ; Plaisirs Minuit, Forde as part of the Fesse-tival, Geneva (2022) ; Peeping through the looking glass, Set Space, London (2021) ; Fotoromanza, Le Commun, Geneva (2021) ; Silicon Malley, Prilly (2020) ; Weaving home, Limbo Space, Geneva (2020).
This project is sponsored by the Federal Office of Culture and the Republic and the Canton of Geneva.
Paul Paillet, Surprise/Innocence, animation video, 7′24′′, music, 2023
Paul Paillet’s work composes the fragmented narrative of an intimate history immersed in a collective history, combining references to both pop culture and the underground culture of the 1990s-2000s.
Surprise/Innocence by Paul Paillet is an animation video-clip based on a series of drawings. Before proceeding to a personal technique of collage, Paillet marouflages his paper in a mould, giving it a slight embossed effect. The glue he uses is tinted with natural pigments. As it dries, the paper detaches itself from the mould, impregnated with colours which are often bright and zingy. This process reveals a final drawing with an aqueous appearance on the paper surface.
Paul Paillet used this same methode to create the scenery of Surprise/Innocence, a succession of hills against backdrop of a sunset and more or less enigmatic architectures, from which a character suddenly emerges, crudely sticking out his tongue, in a dance which is both hypnotic and clumsy. Reminiscent of vertical smartphone screens, the animation loops to a Hardtek soundtrack coupled with the voices of the K-pop group BTS. They are actually reading excerpts from Hermann Hesse’s novel Demian. Die Geschichte einer Jugend (1919), an ironic cross between the alternative spirit of the 1960s and the South Korean interplanetary boy band.
Paul Paillet (1986, Dijon) lives and works in Geneva. His work has been presented in various solo exhibitions, including Fantasy at the Salle Crosnier, Geneva (2022); Fascination for fire at the Centre d’édition contemporaine, Geneva (2020). He has also taken part in numerous group exhibitions: Sublime Rage at French Place, London (2022) ; Atmosphères at la Pace Gallery, New York (2021).
BTS, WINGS, Shortfilm #1, Begin
The realms of day and night, two different worlds coming from two opposite poles, mingle during this time.
BTS, WINGS, Short Film #2 LIE, 2016
My parents’ house made a realm. This realm was familiar to me in almost every way, mother and father, love and strictness, model behaviour and school.
BTS, WINGS, Short Film #3 STIGMA, 2016
It was the first fissure in the columns that had upheld my childhood which every individual must destroy before he can become himself. Such fissures and brands grow together again, heal, and are forgotten, but in the most secret recesses they continue to live and bleed.
BTS, WINGS, Short Film #4 FIRST LOVE, 2016
There are enormous ways which god can make us lonely and lead us back to ourself. This was the way he sealed with me at that time.
BTS, WINGS, Short Film #5 REFLECTION, 2016
The other realm, however, overlapping half our house was completely different. A loud mixture of horrendous, intriguing, frightful, mysterious things, including slaughterhouses and prisons, drunkards, scratching fishwives, calving cows, horses sinking to their death, tales of robberies, murder and suicide.
My sin was not specifically this or that, but consisted of having shaking hands with the devil. The devil held me in his clutches, the enemy was behind me.
BTS, WINGS, Short Film #7 AWAKE, 2016
The bird fights its way out of the egg. The egg is the world. Who had been born must first destroy a world. The bird flies to God. That God’s name is Abraxas.
BTS, WINGS, “Blood, Sweat & Tears”, 2016
He too was a tempter. He too was a link to the second, the evil world with which I no longer wanted to have anything to do.
This project is sponsored by the Federal Office of Culture and the Republic and the Canton of Geneva.
Guillaume Dénervaud’s practice includes drawing, printing, sculpture, and installation, with a focus on forms taken from science fiction, films, comics, and literature. He is also inspired by reality, combining references to decorative and utilitarian objects, reconnecting with materials, techniques and forms often derived from crafts, design or more simply from popular culture and everyday life. He mixes contemporary modes of production with forgotten or rediscovered traditional practices. Guillaume Dénervaud’s graphic work, carefully executed by hand, recalls the precision and rigour of industrial and mechanical technical drawings. But on closer inspection, the figurative graphic language of the latter gives way to a poetic abstraction composed of infinite combinations of cellular, round, or serpentine forms, interconnected by the silky textures of digital renderings.
AGLOROMONES is Guillaume Dénervaud’s first video work. It presents a selection of images shot outdoors, which embody the raw material of the anthropogenic research and concerns which underpin the artist’s entire body of work. Filmed on the route that separates Guillaume Dénervaud’s former residence in the 18th arrondissement of Paris and his studio in Saint-Denis, the images document the artist’s daily observations in this rapidly transforming part of the city. AGLOROMONES presents a series of scenes filmed between abstraction and reality, a crossing of interstitial and peripheral spaces, transit areas between the city and the countryside.
Guillaume Dénervaud (1987, Fribourg) lives and works in Paris. His work has been presented in a variety of solo exhibitions, including Synthetic Splinter at the Bel Ami Gallery, Los Angeles (2023), Surv’Eye at the Centre d’édition contemporaine, Geneva (2021), STRATA at La Cristallerie, Saint-Louis (2020). He has also taken part in numerous group exhibitions : La main-pleur at the Kunsthalle Friart, Fribourg (2022), Des corps, des écritures at the Musée d’art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (2022), Les formes du transfert at the Magasins Généraux, Paris (2022).
The project Videos: new and revisited is sponsored by the Federal Office of Culture and the Republic and the Canton of Geneva.
Guillaume Dénervaud’s video AGLOROMONES is sponsored by the Fonds cantonal d’art contemporain of the Canton of Geneva.
