WHAT’S LIKE A MESSAGE – MIREILLE PERRON

MAIN SPACE EXHIBITION
NOVEMBER 2 – NOVEMBER 24, 1990
RECEPTION: FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 1990 AT 8 PM
ARTIST TALK: SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 1990 AT 2 PM

LOCATION – STRIDE GALLERY
722, 11 AVE S.W, CALGARY, ALBERTA

ARTIST BIO

Born: November 25th 1957, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Works and lives in Calgary, Alberta.

Since 1982, her work has appeared in 36 solo and group exhibitions in Canada, the United States, France, and Italy. Mireille Perron has been teaching Art Theory and Studio for the past twelve years. She has also written and published critical essays on a variety of subjects related to art.

 

EXHIBITION TEXT

As a young girl, I loved to skip rope. I also enjoyed swinging or simply hanging by my hands, rocking back and forth in space. I often climbed a favorite tree in the woods nearby and from this magic place, I was convinced that I could see the whole of my world.

As a woman, it is easy to imagine how much I enjoyed these activities, but I rarely perform them. And the more I educate myself, the more near-sighted I become. When I wear my glasses, the world is flat and precise; when I am not wearing them, the world is blurred and deep. I never wear my glasses while working in my studio. Nor when I make love.

One day, glasses on nose, I was reading about the life of women in ancient Green and came upon this thought: “It is difficult to imagine a better way to symbolize the death of a woman than by separating her from the earth.”

“What’s like a message?” questions the way we acquire knowledge. What, for example, is the link between skipping, swinging, hanging, and making love? In which social theaters do we perform these activities? And for whom?