francine LeClercq

Narcissus's knee (after Caravaggio)

2011-09-18T08:50:00.000-07:00

The LAST SUPPER/ Viimeinen Ehtoollinen in TURKU Cathedral

2011-08-25T19:03:00.000-07:00

Turku, FINLAND, European Capital of Culture 2011
April 18- July 31, 2011

Francine LeClercq, Andy Warhol and Pauno Pohjolainein open a new perspective on a traditional subject

Turku Cathedral, the Finnish national shrine is in for something new and unprecedented when contemporary art fills the chapels of its middle age church. Pauno Pohjolainen's powerful sculpture, the Last Supper has joined the saints painted on the Agricola chapel's walls. The small Tigerstedt-Wallenstjerna chapel features works by the world- renowned legend of pop art Andy Warhol, and a large installation, mise en [s]cène by Francine LeClercq, dominates the Pormestari side chapel. The underlying theme of all the works is one central to Christian art, namely the last Supper. R.W Ekman, who created the fresco of the last Supper in the main chapel, handled the same subject during the mid-1800s.

The exhibition is being curated by Perttu Ollila.

The last Supper exhibition has been organised by Turku and Kaarina Parish Union. Financial assistance has been granted by the Turku 2011 Foundation, the Archidiocese of Turku, the Church Council and the Finnish Cultural Foundation's Varsinais-Suomi Regional Fund. the exhibition is part of the capital of Culture's official program for the year.

Turku 2011 foundation
Turunseurakunnat.fi

Photo: © Kantti/taloforum.fi

Photo: © Jussi Vierimaa

Francine LeClercq's Last Supper Untitled is based on the famous fresco, The Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci and gives the viewer a sense of participation.

The inferred meaning of the title, “mise en [s]cène”: the act of stage setting, or more pertinently: the surrounding of an event, with a bracketed “s”, is a virtual gloss laid on Leonardo Da Vinci’s La Cène (French) more commonly known in English as The Last Supper.

Nearly the same size as the original mural in the refectory of Santa Maria delle Grazie, Milan, the work consists of six suspended boxed panels washed in white gesso on projecting steel brackets attached to a wall built to counter act the weight and serve as a backdrop.

The connection to the Last Supper is immediately evident by the cutout on the panels leaving the contour of the narrative in place, the work is hence summoned in absentia. The life size contour of the humanoids at eye level together with the resulting shadow cast on the wall is a vacancy that is simultaneously occupied by the actual and the fictive, the real presence of the spectator and the story of the narrative.

A table is placed in front of the work with a canvas on which visitors are free to draw and write with the provided oil sticks. Placed at the protagonist’s position is a casing with an ip camera, while the inverted pair of gloves attached to the casing alludes to Christ’s hands, they allow visitors to move the camera, a view from the work out which is transmitted in real time on the internet. The documented images and the canvas produced by the work itself are archived for future installations.

Exhibition Catalogue:
Ollila, Perttu
Viimeinen Ehtoollinen; The Last Supper in Turku Cathedral:
Francine LeClercq, Andy Warhol, Pauno Pohjolainen

Publisher:
Turku and Kaarina Parish Union, Turku 2011
@ 2011 Perttu Ollila/Turku and Kaarina Parish Union

PURCHASE CATALOGUE HERE

TEAM:
Curator: Perttu Ollila
Project Secretary: Jaana Rantala
Graphic Designer: Jari Nieminen/Blind Design
Exhibition architect: Viivi Laine
Contractor: Niku Vaino
Press Officer: Mervi Sipila-Koski

Information: http://www.taivaallistakulttuuria.fi

THE LAST SUPPER/ Viimeinen Ehtoollinen in TURKU Cathedral

2011-04-04T15:49:00.001-07:00

Turku, FINLAND, European Capital of Culture 2011
April 18- July 31, 2011

Francine LeClercq, Andy Warhol and Pauno Pohjolainein open a new perspective on a traditional subject

The exhibition is being curated by Perttu Ollila.
The last Supper exhibition has been organised by Turku and Kaarina Parish Union. Financial assistance has been granted by the Turku 2011 Foundation, the Archidiocese of Turku, the Church Council and the Finnish Cultural Foundation's Varsinais-Suomi Regional Fund. the exhibition is part of the capital of Culture's official program for the year.
Turku 2011 foundation
Turunseurakunnat.fi

Photo: © Kantti/taloforum.fi

Photo: © Jussi Vierimaa

Francine LeClercq's Last Supper Untitled is based on the famous fresco, The Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci and gives the viewer a sense of participation. The exhibition visitor is able to circle the table and take the place of the apostles or place their hands into gloves in a plexiglass box. A web camera housed in the plexiglass box feeds real time events surrounding the communion table, which can be viewed below:

IP CAMERA

The camera is on daily during the exhibition opening hours between 9am and 8pm local time.

Exhibition Catalogue:

Ollila, Perttu

Viimeinen Ehtoollinen; The Last Supper in Turku Cathedral:

Francine LeClercq, Andy Warhol, Pauno Pohjolainen

Publisher:

Turku and Kaarina Parish Union, Turku 2011

@ 2011 Perttu Ollila/Turku and Kaarina Parish Union

EAN: 9789529982813

ORDER CATALOGUE

TEAM:

Curator: Perttu Ollila

Project Secretary: Jaana Rantala

Graphic Designer: Jari Nieminen/Blind Design

Exhibition architect: Viivi Laine

Contractor: Niku Vaino

Press Officer: Mervi Sipila-Koski

Information: http://www.taivaallistakulttuuria.fi

[10] [T] HERE (to Rémy)

2010-01-15T11:37:00.000-08:00

dis.place.ment

In Physics, a work is defined in terms of mass and magnitude; the bare minimum required is a single entity and a ground to chart its shift.

In art, a work is reliant on a presencing, one which is contingent upon a third component: the viewer. The displacement is both a necessity and a fatality; it is a system that feeds on reciprocity. Without it, it will cease to exist.

[T] HERE consisting of two painted blocks bearing orthographic signs, a letter "T" on one preceding the word "HERE" on the other, form this existential stutter, the subject and the object, the here and the there, displaced but unified.

[09] Installation [3:2]

2009-07-30T16:42:00.001-07:00

Large scale painting installation using thermochromic ink which allow the work to be perceived as monochrome or image depending on the temperature of the room and the proximity of the viewer.

FRANCINE LECLERCQ

3:2

September 29 – October 24, 2009

SOHO2O CHELSEA GALLERY
511 West 25th Street, Suite 605
New York, NY 10001

The work consists of painted cells measuring 3 x 2 inches; 3:2 is the aspect ratio in photography now adopted for the LCD screens of digital devices such as the cameras, cell phones and the likes. They will fill the walls of Gallery II.

The clear association is to our bombastic ability to fix and register images on the fly with the aid of these devices, the new format of our perception. In concert halls, press conferences, in streets and parks, in more or lesser degrees the scenario evokes the image of a vaporized display of memories scattered about like gas particles in suspense, fully liberated from the captivity of their once fleshy bunker, the body. The half apocalyptic half ephemeral scene where knowledge is thus remotely held, in a (yet) senseless, un-felt state seems to carry with it the potential nearing of the death of sensation. Hence the gallery’s classic role as a match making box between the subject and the object, the see-er and the see-ee, is employed to facilitate a tête-à-tête with this contemporary condition and restore, however temporarily an atmosphere of sensation or the sensible.

In this respect anything other than direct exchange between the work and the viewer would render the situation picturesque. Painting, the medium by which this operation is motivated would need to be charged, sensitized. A coat of thermochromic ink is applied to cells each bearing an image, causing a nuance such that they may be perceived as an opaque monochrome, a blur or transparent where the underlying image is fully visible depending on temperature and location, the proximity of bodies and heat exchange.

It is an experiment whereby art is the moment of a mutual dependency fermented by an active participation of the senses.

Ali Soltani, 2009

For more information and images please contact gallery director Jenn Dierdorf at 212.367.8994 or email at Soho20@verizon.net or visit http://www.soho20gallery.com

This exhibition is made possible through a generous fellowship from Soho20Chelsea

Thermochromic cell behavior

[08] In Memoriam

2008-12-27T12:20:00.000-08:00

In Memoriam, 2008

5 x 7 inches

Laser engraved plastic sign, wall paint

[06] Cézanne's tablecloth

2008-12-27T09:49:00.000-08:00

This work is a take on Paul Cézanne’s trademark tablecloth (white with a red border) present in almost all of his still life. The original formats of his rectangular canvases have been reproduced and superposed in their exact sizes on a white tablecloth.

In Paul Cézanne’s stable rectangular composition, the tablecloth is a powerful contrast and an element of disorder; we are surprised by its complexity, its alien character among the compact objects on the table. It is like a mountain, a rocky creviced mass, or like some human figure, twisting and turning, with an inner balance of directions. Each bend, fold, and tone is strategically considered in relation to neighboring shapes and colors.

[06] Blind date

2008-12-27T09:10:00.001-08:00

[05] Anadiplosis series

2008-12-26T08:54:00.000-08:00

Anadiplosis (ongoing since 2005)

mixed media , contextual

[06] The nano paintings series

2008-12-09T14:44:00.000-08:00

[08] December Events

2008-12-09T08:49:00.000-08:00

"Make me an offer" The Illinois Institute of Art-Chicago

[07] Mise en [s]cène

2008-12-08T14:42:00.001-08:00

Video By Richard Jochum

Catalogue available:

[08-09] No picture available

2008-12-08T11:52:00.000-08:00

No picture available [081122], 2008

48 x 64 in.

Digital keying paint and thermochromic ink on canvas

" No Picture Available [081122]" is a large canvas painted with thermochromic ink and digital keying paint used in film and photo studios as a background for digital composite images. It is a surface where everything and anything is possible: a surface waiting to become a picture. As this one (image) appears in certain atmospheric conditions (here temperature of the room), the spectator is once again sent back to nothingness as a tautological message reads: "no picture available at this time". The ephemeral nature of an exhibition is expressed... coming back... soon...

No picture available (ongoing series), 2008-09

8 x 10 inches

acrylic on canvas

(Contact fleclercq@nyc.rr.com for purchase)

[03] The Painting and The Gorgon

2008-11-01T08:54:00.000-07:00

Olympia, 60 x 72 in., resin on masonite

Installation Shots

2007-09-09T13:38:00.000-07:00

Catalogue available:

Billboards

2007-09-03T15:02:00.000-07:00

The Billboard Art Project (Chicago 2011)

The Billboard Art project is a nonprofit organization that acquires digital billboards normally used for advertising and repurposes them as roadside galleries. Projects are held in cities all over the country.

PATRICK MIMRAN BILLBOARD PROJECTS

New York City, 2007

24th Street, between 10th and 11th avenues

Ghost in the Machine

2007-08-25T15:56:00.000-07:00

By Ali Soltani

In the thick of opalescence, as if we are suddenly brought in to witness the posthumous findings of an autopsy, a group of things: some lexical, some material, carefully arranged, some fixed, some indeterminate; intentioned, spontaneously, coincidentally, in a rare consortium of words and image, evidently, audibly, mutely, point, form, charge, discharge a dimmed sparsed re-collection that blurts out in various curious sound forms: The Cenacolo or, The Last Supper; in some inflected form it has the sound and shape of La Cène; a less quaint one sounds something like, Shom-eh Akhar.
But what is it doing here?!

First a few words on The Last Super: Roughly 480x880 cm, the picture was painted by Leonardo da Vinci between 1495 and 1498 for the refectory of Santa Maria Delle Grazie in Milan. Like the central figure it depicts, the painting is chronologically flanked by a long list of works that predate it and those done in its aftermath. As early as 1517, that is less than 20 years after its completion, evident cracks and flakes appear on its surface. In 1568, the Italian architect/painter, Giorgio Vasari lamented that: “there remains nothing but a blurred stain”. In 1584 Gian Paolo Lomazzo in his Trattoria Dell’arte della Pittura, Scoultura et Archittetura, declared that “the painting is in a state of total ruin”. Interestingly Lomazzo had gone blind seven years before breaking the news so his account must have either relied on his earlier recollections or by way of word through friends and colleagues.
What is extraordinary, the irreversible truth is that this most talked about of all paintings in which the slightest gesture has sent all in a frenzy in feverish pursuit of its subject stirring dispute amongst the artists, writers, poets, historians, the moral police and the scientist; the painting that in spite of itself has served as the evidence par excellence of so many findings, the famous Cenacolo, had long ago quietly departed the frozen uproar of its devoted narrators, virtually non existent when they erupted.

The observer who is finally let in after long queue might be unprepared, unaware that if allowed to see the work in its authentic present state stripped bare of the mascara of its restorers, the thing the blessed gaze would encounter is likely to be a nebula of pigments powdered across a seemingly immeasurable void, with no discernible protagonist, no apostles, no sign of annunciation, no sacrament; and where is the genius in that? The semblance must do, it is more plausible, more aligned with our inherited memory. All is needed is a little boost of authenticity issued by the proper authorities for the right price of course, a good waiting in line and 15 minutes of allotted time with the Maestro’s masterpiece; the observer is rejuvenated. In all irony, the truly genuine depiction of the inherently commodified and kitsch aspect of The Last Supper has been made evident in none other but Andy Warhol’s tour de force exhibit at the Palazzo Stellino directly across the street from the church where the departed Cenacolo was first painted.

To speak in such terms however is to render the work strictly visual, an attribute of which we only have an after image, whereas the refectory of Santa Maria delle Grazie for which the work was tailored, made its outward extrusion and the sole survivor that bears upon it the trace of the maestro’s touch, has hosted, confided and spawned the thoughts of generations of spectators, from the monks who joined the supper and shared their bread, the chained prisoner when at the dusk of the 18th century the refectory was turned to a prison for a brief period, the expert with the scalpel and the rejuvenated observer.

510 years later in New York, for her third solo Francine LeClercq presents a scenario, a kind of machine-ry in which disparate disjointed parts conjointly ignite a certain thing, a certain readability that might or might not sum to a meaning but nonetheless point to the condition of its existence. This dichotomy between existence and meaning, the relation and oppositions between some thing and what it signifies, the subject and its decalogue or the artificial collection of rules and codes that frames, validates and crops its possibility à la Paul Valery is at the same time the contrasting schism that prevents the formation of an image into a single whole; the work of Francine leClercq is never complete, its fragmentary nature only temporal contingent upon the presence and biases of a single viewer; conjoined with another, our collective notion of the work would resemble the molecular state in liquids, loosely held, flowing to find its final form within the confines of its vessel whether that be a single stretcher or the space where its placed. However, where in the former the tentative contingency of the work was warranted by a seemingly wet and viscid state of acrylic and the resulting peekaboo of the incidental appearance of the viewer on a reflective puddle-like surface; In the latter, this reciprocity is charted along the moving path of the viewer, in other words, the viscous element is the spectator itself leaving its wet trace as if by some capillary attraction guided by an unforeseen itinerary of a vagrant gaze. Hence the selection of an icon as a widely recognized and accepted something seems to be nothing short than a coup against the scholastic practice that rigidifies and wraps the work under a single one size fits all ideogram.
It couldn’t be more false however to think that the work is geared to battle all past meditations, Goethe himself! Good God! Rather, the impulse is similar to a curious child who having dismantled an object to understand its construct but faced with the difficulty of re- assembling it awaits the patronage of an instructor, whether that be the present grown up in the room or the tricksy hoodoo of the ghost of Christmas past. In other words what we have are the remains of a once intact body, catalogued, laid bare, de-authorized seeming to say; “taketh,… you who shall re-assembleth me in any shape or form have understoodeth the art-of living.”

Installation Shots

Press Release

2007-07-29T14:55:00.000-07:00

SOHO2OCHELSEA Gallery
511 West 25th Street, Suite 605, New York NY 10001

Francine LeClercq

Mise en [s]cène
September 4 to October 2, 2007

The chosen title, mise en [s]cène in view of its inferred meaning : the act of stage setting, or more pertinently: the surrounding of an event, with a bracketed “s”, is a virtual gloss laid over none other but the illustrious title of Leonardo da Vinci’s La Cène more commonly known in English as The Last Supper. One of the most enigmatic paintings yet known not only by virtue of its dismal state and the difficulties of its restoration but equally by the complexities and the multitude of clues that has engaged generations of copyists and thinkers, resurrected as it were in Francine LeClercq’s in situ installation seeming like a clinical autopsy with a disembodied table, it serves as a backdrop to find the ancestral link of painting and its context back to da Vinci’s mural.

This is Francine LeClercq’s third solo exhibition in which she continues to investigate the conditions and parameters by which a work whether selected i.e. ready made or produced can be brought to the fore and be judged as art, from inception, the modes and conventions of its production, context and specificity, to its existential status vis-à-vis the viewer.

Catalogue available: