This work is part of a series called UTPICTURA POESIS
And there are three sub-series. They are all made from identical fiber textile, but there are entirely red works (Ut pictura poesis) others white (Open up) and others black (Black figures). The colors correspond to my enthusiasm for silence and slowness (white), dynamics, jubilation and the history of painting (red) and my faults and cracks (black).
They all feature embroidered words in the same color as the background. Light plays an important role, because when you move, certain letters disappear, become dull, or on the contrary become brighter and create unfinished or illegible text.
[… Some were able to embody an intellectually founded posture in some manifest object; others more interested in so-called poetic language, sought to make sense despite established rules of syntax; still others were able to work on the eminently plastic qualities of the letter, remembering that the text was first and foremost a drawing – the Greek origin of the word “graphein” testifies to this. This is how we can understand the “pieces” of Dominique Torrente: as the aesthetic manifestations of a truly modern relationship to language, outside the criteria that usually lead to meaning.
I would happily speak of “maneuvers” rather than works, and this for two reasons. First of all, the recurring practice of embroidery is reminiscent of some “local” history: the techniques of tapestry or lace remain related to certain minor or regional arts; in needlework something of the childhood memory emerges which, although it remains common to us, never becomes anecdotal. The diversity of forms and formats also does not allow Dominique Torrente to be literally placed on the side of "artists" alone: the art there goes beyond this kind of inspired dazzlingness specific to genius exclusively, to reconnect with its original meaning, that of a more proven but true “tekhné”. Here, something is at work.] …
Extract from the text Hors Context by Cécile Fournel,
July 2011
Teacher in CPGE Art and design at ESAA in Lyon
Doctor in design and art sciences, Paris I-Sorbonne University.
Developped by e-Ness, website creation and web agency