Louis Perreault
in Carleton-sur-mer

Openly adopting an artist-curator posture, Louis Perreault presents an exhibit occupied by both a selection of photobooks having in common the desire to translate a lived experience, and a series of images in which books chat and meet one another in a singular photographic context.

The exhibition Les livres du vécu brings together fifteen or so books by Canadian artists sharing a desire to translate a personal experience of a place, of a moment, of an event, of research or of creation. In this photobook approach, the series of images is not enough: the plurality of senses and affects involved must be transposed by way of the work produced. This is done through both the images and the space surrounding them, through both the words used and their arrangement on the page, through both the choice of cover and the visual rhythm deployed. Whether attention paid to the photographic sequence was involved, or an analysis of the graphic-design choices, the artist’s interest was borne by the desire to highlight the relationship between a book and the work it presents. In this selection, the book becomes an independent entity, signifying through itself the meaning received by the reader, sometimes even transcending what the photographs may express by themselves.

At the same time as this selection of works, Louis Perreault presents a photo series entitled Les pages résonnantes. In it he connects various photobooks in order to make up sculptural objects that are themselves then photographed in the studio. This game of recontextualizing works underscores the materiality of the books while at the same time creating thematic and poetic associations among the images from different bodies of photographs. Thanks to these unexpected encounters, the books come to life and are transformed, like the constellations that create connections between stars floating freely in space, indifferent to the aspirations of the human beings who project onto those stellar structures all the fantasy of their imagination.

Complete list of the works presented in the exhibit Les livres du vécu:

• Ammoniaque, Alexis Desgagnés, Les Éditions du Renard, 2021
• I Wish You Could Look Through Me, Antoine Giroux, self-published, 2021
• January, Jessica Auer, Les Éditions du Renard/Ströndin Studio, 2017
• Le jardin d’après, Anne-Marie Proulx, Éditions Loco, 2021
• Les autres imaginaires, Hubert Gaudreau, self-published, 2021
• Murder, Guillaume Simoneau, MACK, 2019
• Notes 01-03, Cristian Ordóñez, self-published, 2021
• On trial, Cristian Ordóñez, acb-press, 2022
• Outre-vie/Afterlife, Collectif, VU Photo, 2018
• Prendre fin, Sarah Boutin, Pièce jointe, 2021
• Rebâtir le ciel, Simon Émond and Michel Lemelin, self-published, 2021
• Sick Days, Ian Willms, self-published, 2022
• Stay Solid or Move West, Chris Donovan, Boreal Collective Press, 2021
• Unmarked Sites, Jessica Auer, Les territoires, 2011

Accompanying this artistic and curating project, a selection of books by the artists in the 2022 programming will be presented to the library.

Top picture: De mains et de roches. With pages of Michel Campeau, Benoit Aquin, Alec Soth, Louis Perreault, Raymonde April, Jeux de mains de Chose Commune and Alex Catt.

Photo 1 (below): Page blanche. With pages of Dorothea Lange and Sam Contis, Ron Jude, Anne Golaz, Kikuji Kawada and Louis Perreault.

Photo 2 (below): Raconter. With pages of Mathieu Asselin, Larry Towell, Louis Perreault, Christian Pattersen, Alec Soth, Adam Broomberg and Olivier Chanarin.

Photo 3 (below): Encres noires. With pages of Charles-Frédérick Ouellet, Tomé Duarte, Simond Émond, Laurent Chardon, Jungjin Lee, Katrin Koening and Sarker Protick ainsi que Yukata Takanashi.