Ceysson & Bénétière is pleased to present The Spaces In Between curated by Francesca Pessarelli. Featuring works by Pierre Buraglio, Louis Cane, Franck Chalendard, Tomory Dodge, Noël Dolla, Sadie Laska, Lauren Luloff, Patrick Saytour, Claude Viallat, and Rachel Eulena Williams, this exhibition will be on view from September 9th through November 7th, 2020.

The Spaces In Between is an immersive proposition to consider the significance of what has been previously left unexamined or relegated to the background. So much lingers in negative spaces. Whether that be a window, a pause, or a transition between seasons, that which is considered empty or latent is, in fact, teeming with possibility. This exhibition brings together ten artists that use negative space, transparency, and motion in a way that engages with their surroundings, collapses the barrier between interior and exterior, and celebrates that which happens in the interim.

The works on view serve to breathe life into the gallery and invite us to see the air, sounds, and light which weave and float through these objects. Supports/Surfaces artists Pierre Buraglio and Louis Cane use the deconstructed structural elements of a painting to create implied windows which frame the walls of the gallery and integrate them into the works themselves, calling the viewer to critically examine space as content rather than simply context. Claude Viallat takes a more playful approach to negative space and movement with his net painting. By saturating a rope net with dye and laying it onto a canvas, we are given an impression of the empty spaces in the net and the notion of an object that was once able move and bend. The result is a collection of abstract shapes which would go on to be the primary subject of Viallat’s oeuvre. Ropes also form the structure of Rachel Eulena Williams’ sculptural paintings. She too renders the rope unmalleable, shaping it into loops and waves that appear to bend the surrounding wall.

Franck Chalendard’s use of translucent layers of acrylic paint is reminiscent of dyes on fabric similar to those used by Lauren Luloff in her silks. Both artists play with transparency and opacity, suggesting that the what lies behind the material—whether that’s the canvas or the wall—is worth considering and engaging with. The rhythmic, energized brush strokes of Sadie Laska’s painting dance and move like dappled light on a wall, creating a dialogue with Tomory Dodge’s layers of color and allusions to landscape and still life which create an abstracted vision of our internal and external worlds. Supports/Surfaces artist Patrick Saytour’s Untitled wooden sculpture also appears to be bathed in streams of golden light and the way it seems to rest so casually on the wall recalls the slowed pace and balmy air of summer. Lastly, Noël Dolla’s Étendoir aux serpillères or ‘Drying rack for mops’ brings summer breeze into the gallery space by evoking the nostalgia of running through lines of drying linens. In doing so, the seemingly rigid boundaries between what is considered interior and exterior begin to falter.

Francesca Pessarelli, July 2020