Xavier Veilhan: Superflou is on view at Galerie de Sèvres, Paris
September 5 – October 5, 2024
Xavier Veilhan’s Superflou exhibition at the Galerie de Sèvres is the culmination of half a decade’s work between the artist and those who shape the spirit of the workshops at the Manufacture de Sèvres. Brought out of the kilns, the Monuments figures, seven table centrepieces in wood and biscuit, and Manfredi, a sculpture in the round in five different colours and stoneware, explore what the artist has been keen on for many years: indefiniteness. Firstly, that of the image, the blurring of form and the boundary between art and the decorative arts.
While Veilhan shows an unconditional interest in technique and craftsmanship, his works combine difference with repetition. They are sanded to the point of hyper definition, adopting this paradox: the fuzzier the treatment, the more precision and resolution it requires. The material is what speaks to the eye, and the eye glides over the sculpture, which reveals only a tiny part of itself, avoiding the freeze-frame. The surface is infinite, though limited, and the eye flows under the fading features of the arm or hip, previously formed by 3D scan modelling but reworked by the hand, which is much more organic and more in tune with the accuracy of the sculpture.
“This invitation to work with Sèvres ceramics raises the question of how to advance or bring back to the present techniques that can be bypassed with faster, more precise means”, says the artist. Xavier Veilhan shows us the essence of the representation of the living, where the hard but silky envelope of the sculptures beckons us to touch them. Resolutely contemporary, these works thwart the artefacts of technology in favour of a ‘return’ to a certain craft, like a race to the necessary displacement of our modernity.
Text by Dimitri Mallet, Exhibition curator
About the artist
Since the late 1980s, Xavier Veilhan (b. 1963, lives and works in Paris) has been developing a protean artistic approach (sculpture, painting, drawing, performance, video and photography) combining classicism, modernity and high technology. His works question our perception and cultivate an interest in spaces for wandering, often evolving, in which the visitor becomes an actor, as in the Veilhan Versailles exhibition (2009), the Architectones series (2012-2014), or Studio Venezia (2017), his proposal for the French Pavilion at the Venice Biennale. His projects often involve collaboration with artists from other fields, such as architecture, music and fashion. In particular, he has created the visual universes for three Haute Couture shows for Chanel (2022-2023).
His sculptures have been installed in numerous public spaces in France and abroad, including the cities of Bordeaux (Le Lion, 2004), Lille (Romy, 2019), Paris (Renzo Piano & Richard Rogers, 2013), New York (Jean-Marc, 2012), Stockholm (Vårbergs Jättar, 2020) and Tokyo (The Audience, 2021).
His work has been shown in a number of renowned institutions around the world, including the Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris), the Mamco (Geneva), the Phillips Collection (Washington), the Mori Art Museum (Tokyo) and the MAAT (Lisbon). Xavier Veilhan is represented by Andréhn-Schiptjenko (Stockholm, Paris), Perrotin (New York, Hong Kong, Paris, Tokyo, Seoul, Shanghai, Los Angeles), Galeria Nara Roesler (São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, New York) and 313 Art Project (Seoul, Paris).
Contact
presse@sevresciteceramique.fr
Galerie de Sèvres
4, place André Malraux
75001 Paris
France
Captions
- Installation views © Aurélien Mole / Sèvres – Manufacture et Musée nationaux © Veilhan / ADAGP, Paris, 2024
- Le Monument n°4, 2023, Porcelaine, contreplaqué de bouleau, vernis / Porcelain, birch plywood, varnish. © Xavier Veilhan – Sèvres © Veilhan / ADAGP, Paris, 2024. Photographe: © Audrey Falet, Sèvres – Manufacture et Musée nationaux
- Le Monument n°7, 2023, Porcelaine, contreplaqué de bouleau, vernis / Porcelain, birch plywood, varnish. © Xavier Veilhan – Sèvres © Veilhan / ADAGP, Paris, 2024. Photographe: © Audrey Falet, Sèvres – Manufacture et Musée nationaux
- Manfredi, 2023 © Xavier Veilhan – Sèvres © Veilhan / ADAGP, Paris, 2024. Photographe: © Audrey Falet, Sèvres – Manufacture et Musée nationaux
