1998 Classeur d’artistes BELFORT LILLE STRASBOURG SAARBRÜCKEN (FR,DE)

This series of black and white drawings is crossed by a multitude of signs in gold ink, like fragments of an ancient writing whose instructions no one would have ever found. At first glance, one believes in an alphabet; at the second, in a code; at the third, one admits that it may be a very important message, but intended for a civilization slightly ahead—or behind — of ours.

In the center, a punched antique computer card imposes its tranquil authority. She seems to guarantee that a system existed, somewhere, even if no one remembers it. Around her, the drawn signs dance, golden and indecipherable, as if the writing had decided to keep its secrets secret.

Gold, the material of the sacred and the precious, covers here an unknown language, perhaps ritual, maybe technical. The drawing thus becomes a zone of organized mystery, a sincere and slightly ironic attempt to make speak signs that prefer to remain silent. The spectator is invited to seek meaning, to invent it, to accept that certain writings exist only for the pleasure of being watched, or even to pretend to understand, what is often asked of human …