Pierre-François Ouellette art contemporain is pleased to present its summer exhibition Verdure, which runs from July 8 to August 26, 2006. This exhibition includes photo-based work, video installation, drawing and painting by Michel de Broin, Alexandre Castonguay, Luc Courchesne, Dil Hildebrand, Louis Joncas, Marie-Josée Laframboise, Marie-Jeanne Musiol, Ed Pien and Annie Thibault. Vedure explores the complex relationships between seeing and representing nature by focusing on the motifs of the forest and the tree – as well as their constituent parts. Artistic interventions within forested areas resonate with perceptual, spatial or mythological undertones in some of the photo-based work on display in Verdure. In other instances, photography and video installation point to the ways in which our perceptions of nature can be mediated through technology. Hand-drawn silhouettes and painted depictions of trees evoke arboreal settings in the remaining pieces in the exhibition, although viewers remain acutely aware that what they see are only allusions to the idea of these places.
The intention of Verdure is not to bring together seamlessly mimetic renderings of forest and flora. On the contrary, it hopes to draw attention to the varying degrees to which our understanding of nature is visually and culturally constructed. In the process, it addresses a wide range of artistic practices that intersect along certain lines of interest.
