From his first pieces from almost twenty years ago, artist Laurent Grasso has set out to make the inconceivable and the invisible visible. And to make them visible in such a way that, when first looked at, they seem astonishingly plausible – such as two juxtaposed suns in the sky. To achieve this high degree of ambiguity, he has deployed a wide variety of skills accumulated over the years, from painting in the manner of medieval Sienese and Tuscan artists to the use of drones and digital imagery.
When entering the Collège des Bernardins, the visitor will see that the Gothic columns are adorned with a series of oil paintings on wood that could have come from the studios of the 17th century Dutch painters Pieter Saenredam or Emmanuel De Witte, who specialized in church interiors and their light-colored architecture. Except that in Mr. Grasso's naves, a gray cloud may be seen floating above the flagstones, or small beads of flame suspended under the vaults. And this is not the only idiosyncrasy: on the other side of the column, the reverse of each painting shows a metal ring attached to a sort of false black stone, and if we are to understand the luminous dots scattered over the stone's surface, a fire seems to burn within – a magic charge. By comparison, the branches with an open eye on each leaf are more easily interpreted, if only by the countless symbols attributed to trees and plants in so many cultures.
The 'Pagan Wall' in the Vosges
The route, which should be taken as slowly as the pace of a Bernadine monk moving through the cloisters, leads to the main work in the former sacristy. It is so dark, one can barely discern the polyhedra placed on the floor as a tribute no doubt to Archimedes and Dürer. "Anima," which is both film and tableau, is projected on the back wall. Mr. Grasso created the work in the Vosges, on Mont Sainte-Odile, where what's known as the "Pagan Wall" winds for 11 kilometers through the pine trees. Constructed with 300,000 superimposed megalithic blocks, it is a defensive wall that has long been attributed to a Celtic race, but is now believed to be more recent – probably Merovingian. There is no doubt though that before the mountain was a place of Christian worship, it was home to other religions.
"Anima" leads the viewer's gaze through the trees and, in keeping with a line from the poem "Correspondances" by Baudelaire, "Man passes through forests of symbols." Here, flames float and dance in the air; glass tubes rise from the ground, like vents through which the breath of the earth can escape; a magician or sorcerer appears and disappears between the rocks; a beautiful fox with a spring in its step follows the line of the stones; and a cloud, sister to those in the paintings, glides past. From time to time, the image lifts, showing the undergrowth as the sky, or turning it upside down. Then it descends again and the walk resumes.
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