Renaud Regnery

Born in 1976, he lives in Berlin.

"The operational method set up by Renaud Regnery for the production of his paintings stems from a precise protocol. He applies layers of black forms which he deletes to then apply others, and so on and so forth. This accumulation of black appears like a cold magma, an earthly world haunted by an image-devouring Saturn" (Cédric Aurelle).

What does the dictum “Wherever I am going, I am already there” do for you?

It's a notion that's at once fatal and dynamic: wherever I am going I am already there, but I'm nevertheless going there intent on verification and in the hope of being able, as from today, to contribute to the nature of whatever I'll find there. It's a parable of artistic action.

A word about your artistic proposal?

A hanging of very recent pictures devised as a set of images ranging from grey to black and tallying in their relations of tension. This is a set of surfaces and reflections, where everything is duplicated, some of the pictures prepared for the Printemps de Septembre having grey grounds made with silver pigments. In some areas, the surfaces thus have a shiny, metallic look. For the transformation of the venue, almost unfeasible in relation to the size of my pictures, I called on an architect, Tarramo Broennimann, of Group8 Architectes (Geneva); this hanging system consists in a use of white walls, like a brochure with irregular angles, on which the pictures are hung. The spectators move about on a black floor which is very smooth and mirror-like. Their silhouettes, as well as the image of the paintings, are reflected in this floor.

What does art enable you to do?

Art, it so happens, enables one to accomplish nothing. It's simply the place which permits you to put at a distance, or distance yourself from, a certain social organization that is too cramped in terms of psychological and spiritual emancipation.