Aude Descombes
Mix Maxence
First row:
Déplacement
, Une tête bien faite
Second row: View of the exhibition
Last row: La courbure des lignes
, Blasons
The myth of Saint Maxence recounts how this 5th century Scottish princess flees her engagement to the pagan prince Avicin, crosses the English Channel and arrives in Gaul, where she fords the river Oise by throwing three stones into the water to make a bridge. Her suitor catches up with her and decapitates her. Maxence rises from the ground and carries her own head to a burial place which will become the present town of Pont Sainte-Maxence.
The inspiration for my residency was to mix elements of this story with my own memory and with my own experience of the Château de Sacy. In our imaginary world, attics are often places where ghosts are to be found, along with discarded furniture, dust mixed with seeds, the past with the future. An attic space conjures up a theatre or church, or even an upside down boat, such as the one Maxence used for her voyage from one reality to another. This is the space in which I chose to work and exhibit.
Looking for something to paint on, I found some left over materials from the château’s attic, mattress ticking, old curtains and nightgowns, worn out things with patterns and holes in them, which I mounted on frames. Birds and flowers, signs and symbols were allowed to accumulate on the canvas, even if they were only dust and seeds, blown in from the garden. Branches were arranged in a cross to suggest a fireplace or hearth, or the interlacing of languages, words woven in an embrace. The flags or coats-of-arms lead back to the Middle-Ages, offering visual access to lines of descent.
The idea was to take advantage of the pattern of the materials, contradicting or repeating them, crystallising them as fragments of time. Odd elements were gathered in a zigzag rhythm of sense and nonsense, to call upon ghosts, reveal structures, and be at the edge of the abstract. Ancient materials were stitched and patched together with others from Creil market, in order to synthesize periods and cultures, to seduce the eye by opening the curtains of a window on somewhere far away. To mix things with symbols was to throw stones in a river, weaving together periods was to create a bridge.
Aude Descombes
Translation: Hugo Williams
Previous Work
Cascade-4: (...)
, 2016
Oil on paper, 151 x 245 cm
Claque des doigts
, 2015
Oil on paper, 175 x 148 cm
Cheval de Troie
, 2014-2015
Oil on paper, 193 x 145 cm
Aude Descombes
Born in Chamonix. Lives and works in Lyon.
Web:
audedescombes.fr
Exhibitions and publications
2016
Exhibition, la Mapra, Lyon.
Participation in the exhibition
L’Attrape-couleurs manifestement!
, l’Attrape-Couleurs, Lyon.
Participation in the exhibition
L’enfance revisitée
, La Remise, Pollionay.
2015
Participation in the exhibition
Nuit d’ivresse
, la Villa Dutoit, Geneva.
Presentation of the play/performance
Fluides
in collaboration with Adeline Toulon.
Participation in the festival
L’Art et la matière
, Drôme-Les-Collines.
Éclats
exhibition in collaboration with Adeline Toulon, Church of Saint-Pierre de Charaix,
Saint Christophe-et-le-Laris, Drôme.
2014
Participation in the residency
Emergency!#2
, la Fonderie Kugler, Geneva.
Presentation of the play/performance
Fluides
in collaboration with Adeline Toulon.
Perspective mortelle
exhibition in collaboration with Claire-Lise Panchaud, la Friche Lamartine, Lyon.
2006
Publication of the bilingual version of
La Vague
, French-Italian graphic novel by Lo Spettatore (translated by Sandrine Ravanel).
Presentation of the work
De l’autre côté de la montagne
, Turin International Book Fair and Asti Fair, Italy.
2005-2007
Creation of
Le neuf
, an artistic work appearing every 3 months with form and content varying according to the viewing public. Collaboration with Claire-Lise Panchaud.
Public activities
2015-2016
Workshop on the customisation of work clothing at the Salève Vocational School, Annemasse.
2011-2012
Teaching of painting to adults for the organisation Peindre à Sainte-Foy, Sainte-Foy-lès-Lyon.
2006-2010
Running of weekly plastic arts workshops for children in the districts of La Caravelle and La Balme with the organisation Arts et Développement à Bron.
2008-2009
Monitoring of a project for students at Collège Mermoz in Lyon on the theme
Objets passeurs de mémoire
, including responsibility for the subsequent exhibition of their work.
2008
Participation in a project constructing tanks from recycled materials for the Les Estivales festival, in collaboration with the artist Némo and local inhabitants from the Mermoz area in Lyon.
Running of a weekly plastic arts workshop for children at MJC Laënnec-Mermoz in Lyon.
2006-2007
Running of workshops on plastic and language expression in collaboration with Jean-François Grassin at the Collège Théodore Monod, Bron.
Work on the project
Les 10 mots de la Francophonie
with the Les Arpenteurs theatre company in Lyon. Creation of poetic posters with children and senior citizens.
Education
2009
DAEFLE (Teaching French as a Foreign Language), Alliance Française, Paris
2002
DNAP (National Plastic Arts Diploma), École de l’Image, Poitiers
1998
CEAP (Certificate in Plastic Arts), École Régionale des Beaux-Arts, Valence
