Pierre Pilonchery. Presentation

PIERRE PILONCHERY
pilonchery.com

PRESENTATION

_Updated on a regular basis

- - -NEWS - - - Next installation, "All The People", Moulding Museum, Lyon France, 2009 - - - NEWS - - - The Contemprary Art Magazine "esse arts + opinions" of Quebec publishes an article by Florence Jaillet about Pierre Pilonchery in its dossier n° 64 Dechets/Waste, Automn 2008 - - - NEWS - - - To participate to the global work " Walker In The Universe, A Global Work " click on section Contents on News - - - NEWS - - - After China in a factory in Beijing and The Gambia in a medical research centre in Fajara the Walker has just walked in Spain in the Contemporary Art Museum of Vitoria Gasteiz - - - NEWS - - - To play with an interactive work click on "The Webcamings" in section Contents - - - NEWS - - - The Contemprary Art Magazine "esse arts + opinions" of Quebec publishes an article by Florence Jaillet about Pierre Pilonchery in its dossier n° 64 Dechets/Waste, Autumn 2008 - - - NEWS - - - Next installation, "All The People", Moulding Museum, Lyon France, 2009 - - - NEWS - - -

My name is Pierre Pilonchery. I was born in 1950..

I'm working with determination on the idea of the increase in the number of details forming large sets. So I get large surfaces made of paper, fabrics, very small televisions, video projections, layers of sounds, pages of texts and many others things yet. I then set them on stage among various elements which comment on them, upset them, or simply complete them. The adding up method sets the aesthetic framework in exhibition conditions which are each time revisited, art can grab on to all the surfaces of life it may chance to meet.

This work is always keeping with a loving look at the world in which we are living from its most simple form of reality to its most unlimited one which means the whole universe. It essentially deals with the matter of the time around us of which we are all and one the center in our own constant contemporaneousness, the accumulation in only one instant of all the instants which weave the stuff mankind is made of in its infinite repetitiveness.

Visual written and sound works methodically set up over a long period of time often several years develop generously a concept of maximalism of which everything can be part of, it's a little like the universe with its large fluid, like a great possible whole I think in which everyone will be able to take part. And the whole lot of this dynamic and prolific hyper texture, really great whatever its context is, that is only action you see and surely neither composition nor even demonstration, only a fabric of activity in fact, as I would say if I wanted to sum up. It is the act of making to assert the act of being, something that one finds everywhere at any era in the whole world.

These workings are called The Erasings that was the time of my beginnings between 1976 and 1978, I had just finished my studies at the Fine Art School in Paris. In this series I create in 1976 the sound work "3mn" which is the tape-recording of a music got by recording brief instants of diverse sounds the beginnings and ends of which are erased so as to juxtapose them. We then get a layers-of-sound effect without beginning nor end, no part of which is maybe more interesting than another. This work now lost remains the first work that started it all even though one can no longer listen to it now.

Then there were The Spacings in 1979, the time when I more or less consciously discovered what I would develop afterwards, the matter of space and its infinity full with a whole at the same time on the basis of an enthusiastic opening to the infinity of the possible things.

Between 1979 and 1982 The Weavings show a transitional period revealed to be decisive, it was the moment when the need for a method became imperative to me in order to work clearly and so to have a great weight taken off my mind.

It's in 1979 and 1980 as well that I imagine and draw some projects of works by satellite bringing together pieces of a work scattered all over the world. I feel then completely involved in a view of a mosaic-like world, it's just a way of looking at it, just a matter of point of view to know how to see it. 28 years later in 2008 the spirit of this work is continued in the global work A Walker In The Universe thanks to the possibilities of exchanges offered by the Internet.

I met John Cage at that time, in July of 1981.

Between 1982 and 1988 I made The Fillings on the principle of the uncertainty which I invented in 1982 to treat by the method the decisive matter of the time which contains everything at the same time. The first Fillings are a series of large surfaces got by sticking on some canvas some pieces of magazines and fabrics previously touched up with acrylic and ink, completed with their prints on fibres, papers, photographs and videos, to make for, along with other elements, sounds and objects, environments in which one can freely walk around.
The series is taken up again in 2003, fifteen years later, thanks to some technologies which enable me to use the images and sounds received live on all our television screens.

In 1984 in the afternoon of June 6th, John Cage paid me a visit at my studio of Lyon, France.

In 1985 I worked with Ann Sarah Yan on the costumes and scenery of a choreographic show by Michel Hallet-Eghayan, "Suite d'été", for the international contemporary dance festival in Montpellier, France.

That same year I began The actings, and I applied in my writings the same methods I used in my visual works, the writing of my text “The Beautiful Places of the Artist” lasted more than 15 years from 1986 until the end of 2001.

From 1992 up to 1998 I intensely work on The Sewings, some pieces of work a little alike the huge tapestry of the cosmos, and I undertake long and tiring handcrafted techniques which for this reason I decide to stop. The Sewings are a series of very large surfaces got by sewing together on a long time's work some pieces of fabrics touched up with acrylic and images printed by computer, staged along with other elements and various objects which complete and challenge them if you so wish.
In 2002 I take up the sewing series again, to fullfill an order, enhancing it in the process with new elements in the installations' lay-outs which will be created and the variety of the images that will be printed.

During the autumn 1994 at Marc Dachy's invitation I took part in the 20000 additions publication with 26 other people and then in the distribution in several French cities of the famous poem by Kurt Schwitters Ann Blossom, it was a tribute.

Then since 1999 I have been working on The Advertisings, a great cycle of projects made by numeric sketches before the making up and the final installation for which I'm looking for means and places of production. This important series of The Advertisings develops a very methodical process with infinite possible variations: some large surfaces called weavings obtained by weaving strips cut out of leaflets and advertising catalogues are staged along with objects or other elements different in each installation in order to enrich and transform the meaning where each and every one in their own way can enter to find themselves there..
In 2005 and 2006 I am preparing for the automn of 2006 a very large visual and sounding installation made of several stations, The Large Space and All Its Places, produced by the trade name of a chain of shopping center where I thus bring back the leaflets and advertising catalogues which they have printed, but turned into a work of art.
In February 2007 I install 250 m2 worth of surfaces obtained through these catalogs and leaflets completed with lights and sounds under the guise of an evolutive construction site which lasted for two weeks in a disused warehouse, the installation is called Some Places and Their Moments.
In September 2008 the Contemprary Art Magazine Esse Art + opinions of Quebec publishes in its N° 64 Dechet/Waste an article about The Advertisings by Florence Jaillet, "The Perishable Papers of Pierre Pilonchery".
All these paper works of The Advertisings are therefore wasted if nobody preserves them. They can be stored inside containers sheltered from the light. These containers are showed like stocks, with documents, films, pictures and text about what they contain, and from time to time the surfaces showed in always revisited stagings.
In May and June 2009 the installation WALKER wich gives an account of the global work Walker In The Universe, A Global Work showes 120 m2 of The Advertisings paper surfaces unrolled and hung up in the entrance Forum of a universitary building at Lyon, France, with the projection of the film Walker In The Universe and of all the films of it's different projections around the world.

In the same perspective The Printings which were started in summer 2002 show a very big photograph of a landscape printed by industrial technique on a 1 to 40 meters long synthetic fabric put up in this same landscape and, in the process, a piece of the huge patchwork of the universe where we are is drawn in each installation. I try out different interventions via numeric projects or in situ realisations both in a town and in a mountain landscape and even on the Red Planet for which realisation I am sending Nasa the project of an intervention made to be transmitted live to Earth by satellite on the first manned martian mission.

In 2004 I add to my works The Visionings, environments put on by computer where sounds and pictures make up a complex score where the multiplicity of the world meets the uniqueness of everything and everyone whoever we are. That's a set of films projected onto various elements (stacks of cardboard boxes, softly spread out fabrics, sand, water, antic sculptures, visitors wearing white house painter coveralls put at their disposal in the entrance to the exhibition. ) to make up environments which get surfaces of visions picked up from TV and worked by computer to accumulate them by juxtaposing them in a strong density in the visual and the sound in the same time.
In 2007 and 2008 I am preparing All The People , an installation in 2009 for the Moulding Museum, Lyon France, which I fill up with scaffoldings to support an important film and sound broadcasting equipment. 500 small films moving against a red background are projected at the same time upon the museum's statues, all the sounds mixing together. It's like a way of looking at the construction site of the human hive of activity among all its idols on to which it clings, from those of the past to these from another order altogether.

On January 20th 2005 I give my lecture From the Modern Art to Contemporary Art the Art and the Life or the World as it is for 20 Directors of the famous French retailing chain Auchan France, on the initiative of Michel Carles its Development Manager. It's a piece of the life of Art, just a way to find for today's Art some other places to exist in. The lecture will be given several times.

In the same train of thought I'm very busy for 2005 preparing for a shopping center my project The Large Space an all its Places and I begin The Filmings undertaken in my notes since a long time already. The Filmings present themselves as surfaces got by projecting alone or along with another installation different sets of short films which can be shown separately or all in a continuous loop by adding them to one another. We can see in them simple and banal and also strange actions in the form of a collection of ordinary actions each of which producing in its own way its particular sounds which can so juxtapose themselves or superimpose themselves in a simultaneous projection, it's a disorganized concert yet each time very well composed. The Filmings could be broadcast on TV, one by one in the evening, as an interlude for relaxation beetween two programmes.

From the 13th to the 21th of october 2006 I exhibit The Large Space an all its Places throughout a shopping arcade in a shopping center in Lyon, France. It's a very large visual and sound installation made of 6 stations and some other interventions. I'll have my lecture about this exhibition, Some Flimsy Places, given there as a performance with 15 performers. The film "A Sunday In the Countryside" is written and directed by Marie-Sophie Chambon about this exhibition. The manifestation, artwork, advertising dispositive, and film are altogether produced by the Auchan trademark which works in this instance as event organizer with no commercial action.

From the 5th to the 16th of February 2007 I create the installation Some Places and Their Moments with circus artist Amaury Jacquot under the guise of an evolutive construction site which lasted two weeks in a disused warehouse confluence of the Rhône and Saône rivers in Lyon, France, where I mix together paper surfaces, lights, and sounds. This is an response to the invitation from the student association "Les Temps d'Art" to be part of their manifestation "To The Arts Etc. ... Construction Sites Open To the Public" the objective of which is to allow art to exist beyond the usual locations of art by offering artists residences on a two-weeks basis in the diversity of the urban network so as to get different artistic fields to entwine, thus bringing out the creative process. We give there on the closing night the performence Moment Z for nine performers, sound broadcasting, and vedeoprojection.

From December 2007 I put on line The Webcamings an interactive work on the Internet . The Webcamings are a sort of self-portraits published by way of the most instantaneous media, Internet and its immediacy. I thus mark my interest in Internet as support and means of artistic creation. The Webcamings present themselves as a surface of very small films of 30" each added up on a grid over a course of years to simply collect them . In each film the artist speaks of many things which may occupy his thought and which can of course all be mixed together : you can listen to these films one by one so as to hear the artist's words or else by adding them as you please in order to make up a very aleatory and free concert of voices. You then get a sound surface where the meaning to understand is replaced with the experience to live for the visitor who is conducting it, it's always the idea of the work like a score which can be at each interpretation always revisited.

Walker in the Universe, A Global Work is a global work set in motion from February 2008 upon the surface of the whole Earth by actors co-authors found via the Internet to project the film Walker in the Universe in different points of the world ( ... France, United-Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, United-States, Canada, China, Russian, New-Zeeland, Australia ... ) in the most various plublic and private places (a flat, a factory, an Art Centre, a hospital, an university, a shopping centre, etc...). All the places we pass through are worth turning our attention to. This work continues the projects of works by satellite sketched in 1979 and1980 thanks to the possibilities of exchanges offered by the Internet. Now the Walker continues his walking without any limit throughout the years.
In May and June 2009 the installation WALKER gives an account of this work for 6 weeks in the Forum and the Gallery of an university building in Lyon, France.

In September 2008 the Contemprary Art Magazine Esse Art + opinions of Quebec publishes in its N° 64 Dechet/Waste an article about The Advertisings by Florence Jaillet, The Perishable Papers of Pierre Pilonchery.
From 14 May to 26 June 2009 I create on Florence Jaillet's initiative the installation WALKER for the "Ecole Normale Supérieure Lettres et Sciences Humaines of Lyon", France. This installation in 3 parts gives an account of the global work Walker In The Universe, A Global Work. 120 m2 of The Advertisings paper surfaces are unrolled and hung up in the entrance Forum with, in the near gallery, the projection of the film Walker In The Universe and of all the films of it's different projections around the world. A performance enables one to hear all those background noises of the world taken from the films that were sent.

On 20 June 2009, participation to a young business managing directors conference. A speech about the links between the individual and the collective. It's still art as a transformation force with exchange and experimentation notions.
So it's now necessary to note the flexible and easy capacity of all these works of adapting themselves to the various and multiple sorts of places which can receive them to show them, anything can be imagined as for example to mingle them and turned them into something else like scores which you can play with great flexibility. Each new exhibition offers a joyfully revisited new version. We also live with a wealth of technologies that allow us to yet again enlarge to the most the conditions of exhibitions of everything that we do. It is also worth mentioning the manufacture of marketable by-products, some prototypes have already been made. At last I would add that the complete installations by the shift from an long easy to spot handcraft practice to the fast and multiple and often attractive contemporary one as the copies new technological means allow us to do insist on the notion of simultaneity being aimed at any kind of thought here or there at the same time within the culture and outside the culture towards other cultures, it means the point. I do this in exchange to live in peace because I readily take the light of the Earth at the pace of the experience I live through. Seeing what is exhibited enables one to see the world and the whole universe around what is exhibited, each one becomes the center of this whole universe.

And all these works are only stakes what I mean is that it is like in a game, we set up rules to get some different operations and what is there may be not there and what is not there may be there, quite simply. All things considered, all this work would like to express a principle of happiness in the light of existence, we are really always all contemporaries without any limit of time and space that is for me quite obvious. It's just a way of looking at things. One day someone told me that one receives a great amount of youth and energy while facing my work and I'm delighted with it. Each one can see him or herself.

The construction site is opened to the public and many more things are in preparation.

. .

Contact

Contents