Antonin Bouchy
A Simple Transformation

A Simple Transformation explores, through the chemical process of plaster’s solidification, a form that has long been a subject of study for artists, the fold.

Defined by Gilles Deleuze as the essence of the Baroque, and adopted as a method of painting by Simon Hantaï, the fold offers a fascinating, enigmatic and ambiguous aspect, somewhere between abstraction and figuration.

Is it possible to grasp complex notions by simply transforming the way we look at reality?

The asperities of the fold offer to the eye an infinite variation of a single shape, an undefined number of views depending on the point of observation, its multiplication creates a space of projection made up of hollows and edges, which, from wherever we look, presents an aspect hidden from our gaze, imbued with a certain mystery.

Through the simple process of gypsum solidification, it is possible to freeze this supple, light form in a precarious equilibrium. The falling drape then becomes a self-supporting structure, a sculpture which, through its folds, support itself, defying gravity and confronting two states of matter.

The fluid and the static, the heavy and the lightness…

How to offer, by the simple combination of two materials, a basis for open reflection on the artistic gesture?

If freezing the fold of a drape in a state of suspension through this simple technique evokes a sort of paradox, the idea of simplicity underlying this project is part of a deliberate economy of means that calls into question the artist's gesture and the laborious value that one can associate with the work of art, by a kind of sleight of hand, while referring to classic notions of art (monochrome, column, baroque) to deliver an abstract generative visual form.

Antonin, as a flâneur in the contemporary artistic landscape, explores through different mediums and a light aesthetic, various concepts such as absurd, paradox, laziness and contemplation, with the aim to deliver a body of work imbued with poetry.

Antonin Bouchy was born in Lorient (FR) in 1990. Graduating from the Fine Art School of Brest, he now lives and works between France and Bulgaria. He has been part of several collective exhibitions in Bulgaria and, more recently, in the Netherlands and India.

The exhibition is supported by Tequila Bar Fnky Mnky.