Caroline Denervaud (1978, Switzerland) lives and works in Paris.
Caroline Denervaud dances and paints. The order doesn’t really matter, as the ending of a gesture doesn’t stop its movement. On the contrary, each composition immortalises the vitality of a past moment, forming a body with its medium. The spectacle waits in the wings. On the ground, lying on the canvas, the artist moves on a surface that records the rhythms. The traces keep some contours of a human presence in motion, translated into a sensitive geometry. This process stirs awake a long-standing anthropocentric tradition, articulating a conception of the world from the proportions of a singular figure. The self. From the Renaissance’s Vitruvian Man to Modernism’s Modulor, these icons of engineering envisaged the advent of new eras by advocating for their anatomies as reference points. Space is thus constructed according to her own measurements. This harmony establishes a relative stability, aiming for balance. Colour is quickly added to the initial drawing, also originating from the flesh. Pinks, then reds, form the basis of arrays that become more precise, in sections. Improvisation remains primordial for this artist intent on countering academicism. In this vein, she escaped two curricula, dance by necessity, painting by choice. Today, her practice celebrates the fusion of art forms, plural and without capitalization. Her large-scale works are exhibited un-stretched, supple, and yet marked by the tensions and releases that muscles have inscribed into this pictorial field. Their landscape opens a horizon of freedom.
Caroline Denervaud is represented by gallery Double V (Marseille, FR)
Text by Joël Riff, Critic & Curator – Moly-Sabata / Albert Gleizes Foundation
