Texts

With multiple meanings and multiple colours, the universe of Aurélie Menaldo draws us into childhood, into holiness and also into surreal absurdity. Her artistic work begins with the collection of all sorts of objects that she chooses because of their appearance, their basic material and their colours. From this basic vocabulary, she composes and assembles sculptures and installations that she designs mostly in relation to where they will be exhibited. At the same time she intersperses her creations with extracts of texts which inspire their titles. Her work evokes feelings of both familiarity and unusualness, brought about by the improbable […]

As we know, artists are lay priests. Their task is to draw a circle on the ground and indicate to the community the unity on which it is founded. This unity takes root in our immediate environment; the gods are first of all the local gods, the gods of the land – so that some religions have been called pagan (paganus, “of the land”). In Saint-Etienne, our Athena, a centre located on the outskirts formed by the railway line, is obviously the slag heap. Strange goddess of the underground forests, useful in the forge, in the home and in war. […]

AS THE WORLD FALLS DOWN While the world stumbles and heads towards its own destruction, and beyond the apocalyptic title of the exhibition – borrowed from Bowie1 – Aurélie Menaldo raises the question : « Is joy within our reach? […] If chaos reigns, it gives us the freedom to change things, to hit the bottom hoping that everything will bounce back differently ». An offbeat breath of oxygen, unexpected and tangible from the very threshold of the exhibition : « Paradise Lost2 ». PARADISE LOST The artist places an imposing creature at the entrance. Using swimming pool noodles, she […]

Like a thoughtful mockery, Aurélie’s proposals invite us to explore a world of paradoxes that generate micro-fictions. There is the Vs Park (2012), a small community of colourful shapes spread over a circumscribed ground. They are rodent cages deserted by their inhabitants, a chaotic, short-lived mass generated by the most invasive and harmful everyday material, plastic. Recovery and reuse throughout, two constant gestures in Aurélie’s proposals, for Nécropolis (2016), a city of the dead according to the etymology, coloured and recycled waste are arranged on shelves, like so many visual resonances of an alignment of offerings for the dead. This […]

“Tripod or the Launching of Reality ” is an aquatic scene in which Aurélie Menaldo invites us to enter. In this theatre, we think we recognize objects, we think we have already seen them yesterday, at home, in our daily lives, in our neighbour’s apartment. We believe we can name them with our vocabulary but, immediately, we lose them and they escape us. The assembly, the display, the drawing, shift and alienate the forms, pushing them into the unreality of a formal game associated with the naivety of a glance. The artist thinks about the honesty of visual forms, pays attention to a few […]

“I feel so strange,” said Alice, “it feels like I’m crawling into myself and closing like a telescope.” She ventured into the long transparent tube with iridescent plastic reflections. With small steps, she walked cautiously through the horizontal entrance to the tunnel bathed in an attractive green light. She then slid smoothly down a blue then yellow slope. Alice paused for a moment in a red capsule where she admired the panoramic view of the white room turned magenta. Letting herself fall, she did several somersaults in the tube, which although solid, was flexible and soft. After turning several corners […]

“… There will be no one here to scold me if I get too close to the fire. Oh ! How funny it will be when my parents see me through the looking glass and they can’t catch me! ” Lewis Carroll Cosimo climbed up to the fork of a large branch, where he could sit comfortably, and he sat there with his legs dangling, his arms crossed, his hands under his armpits, his head tucked under his neck, his tricorn pressed against his forehead (…) – Yes, but I will not go down! – And he kept his word.  Italo Calvino […]

With multiple meanings and multiple colours, the universe of Aurélie Menaldo draws us into childhood, into holiness and also into surreal absurdity. Her artistic work begins with the collection of all sorts of objects that she chooses because of their appearance, their basic material and their colours. From this basic vocabulary, she composes and assembles sculptures and installations that she designs mostly in relation to where they will be exhibited. At the same time she intersperses her creations with extracts of texts which inspire their titles. Her work evokes feelings of both familiarity and unusualness, brought about by the improbable […]