Travelers have their habits, their rituals, even more than sedentary people. Joël Andrianomearisoa is constantly moving. The artist lives between Paris and Antananarivo, in Madagascar, he is exhibited everywhere, attends fairs and exhibitions. And wherever he goes, he always has notebooks full of notebooks. Small notebooks, often Moleskine, without a line, which he frantically fills with words, drawings, inspirations. “They are life notebooks”, says the 46-year-old visual artist, in his workshop on 14e Parisian district, turning the pages, carried away the content of some (there, a reference to Marguerite Duras, there, words which arose throughout her moods), leaving the mystery hovering over others.
It is often a question of poetry in the work of Joël Andrianomearisoa, of what a few words put together without logic or coherence can create a sensation on the person who reads them. As with the poets of the 1960s and 1970s or those before them of the Beat generation, words accompany his life, his daily life. But the fragile sheets of his notepads are a first step. An ambitious artist, he is appreciated by the art world. And of these “life diaries”, the Franco-Malagasy makes monumental, often impressive installations.
In 2019, at the Malagasy pavilion of the Venice Biennale, he presented I forgot the night, large installation of black tissue paper. In 2021, he had an 8 meter high metal structure erected in the heart of Antananarivo, his hometown, which displayed in capital letters “Here we carry the dreams of the world”. Sculptures of this type have spread elsewhere, in the city’s airport, but also in France. Thus, such a structure, bearing the message “To the rhythm of our desires, let us dance on the wave of time”, was installed for the Cité internationale de la langue française, at the Château de Villers-Cotterêts, in Aisne, a flagship cultural institution. . of Emmanuel Macron’s second five-year term. In the fall of 2023, he would exhibit sculptures in a basin in the Tuileries.
A constant coming and going
His exhibition at the Almine Rech gallery in Paris is equally impressive. Curated by Jérôme Sans, “Things and Something to Remember Before Daylight” is a dive into his world. “I show everything I like”, he said smiling. In the space of the Marais gallery, in Paris, neon lights, paintings, tapestries, sculptures, everyday objects mingle. A sound piece, produced in collaboration with the singer Camélia Jordana, resonates in the spaces. And an olfactory piece was created with the complicity of Diptyque, a perfumer with whom the visual artist had collaborated, in October 2023: during the Paris+ fair, the artist unveiled a beautiful triptych including one of his sculpture-poems, a collage and a set of drawings.
You have 53.21% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.