Lucile Desamory at the STUK



STUK presents a solo exhibition with works by Lucile Desamory (born 1977, Brussels; lives and works in Berlin). The exhibition features a large selection of paper works, her new film Haut les coeurs (High the hearts) and a work realised together with Lucy McKenzie (born 1977, Glasgow; lives and works in Brussels) especially for the space.

Lucile Desamory is self-taught and active in various art disciplines. She makes films, creates paper collages, and makes models and three-dimensional installations. Her inspiration source for the works on paper are cuttings from her large image archive, with which she creates a rich, dreamlike world. The combination of images and motifs results in a bizarre game with scale, size and perspective. Her models provide the setting for absurd and fantastic scenes. In the STUK Desamory presents a large number of new models. In the exhibition hall Lucile Desamory and Lucy McKenzie created a new installation, a composition with life-size two- and three-dimensional figures.

Desamory started to make films ten years ago. She has made experimental films, in which she uses animation and pixilation techniques films a (Clone zone, in collaboration with Patricia Gélise, Countdown to Nothing, in collaboration with Kevin Blechdom, etc.). The artist creates a personal, almost psychedelic world, combining outdoor shots with photographs and paper collages. The viewer will notice innumerable references to historic films, from silent movies to the great classics.

In 2006 Desamory started to work on a series inspired by her fascination with the “Devils Corner”, a popular quarter of Brussels, situated around the Rue Notre-Dame-du-Sommeil. Since the 1950s the Devil's Corner has stood in ill repute. The homonymous pub in the quarter was once known as a meeting place of marginal figures that assembled there to plot rogueries of all sorts. As a child, Desamory often listened to stories about the quarter and fantasies about it still haunt her imagination. They inspired her to create a book with collages, several paper models and a film scenario.

The film Haut les coeurs (High the hearts) is a surreal combination of collages and images from books and shots filmed in a studio and in Berlin. The scenes are like dreams in dreams of the main character. A phrase from the film, “the brain is wider than the sky…” (Emily Dickinson), quite appropriately characterizes the imaginary world Desamory evokes. Nicolas Bussmann composed the soundtrack of the film.

An important aspect of Desamory's work is her collaboration with other artists. Earlier she worked and performed with musician Kevin Blechdom, e.g. in the Fondation Cartier in Paris. She has made installations with Lucy McKenzie and Birgit Megerle in places such as the Talbot Rice Gallery in Edinburgh, Galerie Meerrettich, Volksbühne in Berlin and the Cabinet in London. Recently she exhibited her work at Eldorado, an exhibition curated by Anne Pontégnie (Drantman Galerie, Brussels), and in the Nomadeoase in Hamburg.

Info:

STUK Kunstencentrum
STUK Arts Centre

Naamsestraat 96
B-3000 Leuven, Belgium

 Tel. +32 (0)16 320 320
info@stuk.be - http://www.stuk.be/

Opening times:
wed-thu: 1 p.m. – 9 p.m.
fri-sat-sun: 1 p.m. – 6 p.m