Proposal:
Humour is one of the many casualties of the COVID pandemic. Gravity and earnestness (feigned or genuine) have become the stylistic hallmark of this era, and tend to have been embraced wholeheartedly by the artistic community.
As a someone who lives in the UK – the country with the highest death toll in Europe – and is deemed highly vulnerable, I am all too aware of the gravity of the situation and its effects on individuals and society at large. Yet I have grown impatient with the inflated metaphors, the self-indulgent speak and the unwarranted displays of sentimentality to which we are being subjected on a daily basis. Hence the four pieces presented here, which were initially conceived as mail art.
“… la meme chose” and “Greetings from the Brink” are meant as quizzical takes on headlines such “Things will never be the same” and “Quarantine, a unique opportunity for self-exploration”, while “Le Rhône” and “Bienvenue en Vendée” – two photo-collages inspired by postcard messages by French writer Georges Perec – are humorous evocations of those cherished foreign holidays in the sun threatened by travel bans.
Biography:
Franco-British writer and photographer living and working in the UK.
My creative work draws on my background in language and literature, and my research in the relationship between text and image. I try to do with images what one does with words – that is combine them, layer them, string them together to create dynamic tension. In works that combine text and image – be they photobooks, artist’s books, videos or single-image works – photographs and images are meant to offer questioning counterpoints to one another.
My work has been shown internationally in juried group exhibitions, notably at the Davis Orton Gallery, Hudson, NY (2013, 2020–21), the Rencontres Internationales de la Photographie, Arles, France (2016, 2017) and the Bower Ashton Library, Bristol UK (2021), as well as at the Joburg Fringe (2014, 2018–19).
Web site: http://www.mireilleribiere.com
WORKS:
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Artist: Mireille Ribière Title: Greetings from the Brink, 2020 Medium: Giclee print mounted on watercolour paper Size: H:240 W:290 D: Edition:0 Price:R |
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Artist: Mireille Ribiere Title: …la même chose, 2021 Medium: Giclee print mounted on watercolour paper Size: H:240 W:290 D: Edition:0 Price:R |
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Artist: Mireille Ribiere Title: Le Rhône, 2020 Medium: Giclee print mounted on watercolour paper Size: H:240 W:290 D: Edition:0 Price:R |
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Artist: Mireille Ribiere Title: Bienvenue en Vendée, 2021 Medium: Giclee print mounted on watercolour paper Size: H:240 W:290 D: Edition:0 Price:R |