GUYLAINE CHEVARIE-LESSARD
Euphoria
November 7 - December 16, 2022
Guylaine Chevarie-Lessard, Abysse #57 (Detail), 2021. Photo by Paul Litherland
Exhibition description
In the depths of the abyss, when breathing becomes slower and the light more tenuous, euphoria takes hold of the diver. To quote Freud, he is filled with an "oceanic feeling,” a feeling "of something unlimited, infinite." This feeling takes hold of the body when it becomes one with its environment; it is free of any border between interior and exterior, and even of physical landmarks. This pleasure is fleeting, and the diver must quickly return to the surface to avoid the point of no return. The world in which we live is full of uncertainties and can be asphyxiating; Euphoria is that precise, risky moment when the body still breathes joy at the edge of the precipice. This project continues the work begun with the exhibition Abysses, presented at the McClure Gallery in 2020, exploring the possibilities of pictorial installation. Work in poetic form is privileged.
About the artist
Guylaine Chevarie-Lessard is an emerging multidisciplinary artist and essayist. She works between Montreal and Frelighsburg, Quebec. Her works are held in private and corporate collections, including the Desjardins Group. She has presented several solo exhibitions in Quebec and Canada, most recently at the McClure Gallery, QC (2020) and at the Maison des arts de Laval (2018-19). She received her PhD in Art Studies and Practices from l’Université du Québec à Montréal (2015), and her dissertation was published in 2019 by Nota Bene (La voix entre l'audible et le visible). She also holds a master's degree in Philosophy of Art (UQAM, 2001) and a bachelor's degree in Visual Arts (Concordia University, 2009). She has received grants from the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec and the Canada Council for the Arts.
Press
Tremblay, Chevarie-Lessard: View from above, below and beyond. Westmount Independent. 8 Decembre, 2020, p.21.
Tendre l'oreille à la matière picturale de Mimi Haddam, Esse arts + opinions, dossier : (Re)voir la peinture, No 102, printemps 2021. (Essai littéraire s’inspirant de La voix entre l’audible et le visible, photos de 2 œuvres de la série Abysses)
Correspondance en studio : Guylaine Chevarie et Karen Trask. Revue Vie des arts. Été 2020. no.259. 3p. (Photos de 2 oeuvres de la série Abysses).
