Jonathan Villeneuve holds a Master in Fine Arts from Concordia University in Montreal since 2009. His work is multidisciplinary and deals with sculpture, installation and new medias. His work as been showed in Canada & Europe. He is an active member of the Perte de Signal collective since 2005. He lives and works in Montreal.
Do the Wave, is made out of three identical structures. These structures, built out of common construction material (two by four and two by twelve etc.), each holds 21 two by four wood pieces, suspended vertically. The camshaft at the back of the structure, driven by a low speed motor, inducts a wave motion to the wood plates. The two-by-four moves up and down, pushed by the rotation of the cams. The formal aspect of the whole evokes the construction work that constantly reshapes and inhabits the urban landscape that I have observed while commuting between Montréal and St-Sauveur (my home town) along the 15 highways.
The kinetic aspect of the piece evokes the optical effect that form while driving by fences and barriers on the side of the highway. It also evokes the movement of a crowd doing the wave in a stadium. A crowd doing the wave is carried by a chain reaction without knowing who started the initial movement. In this mass movement, each is an actor and a participant in a spectacle onto which no one has any individual control. The actions of each individual is dictated by ones neighbor. The piece considers the parallel between the action of the crowd doing the wave and the movements that dictate the developing of urban landscape.
Trace is a collaborative installation in three stages. Its design pools the plastic and conceptual concerns of the artists with a will of complementarity and exchange.
Led by a computational, sculptural and sound work, the project tries to create a physical impression in the viewer. The collective creation allows the artists to develop new aesthetic, sensory and technical approaches.
A multi-faceted work, Trace explore many sides of the same idea. Three sculptural elements give insight on a daily experience that is lived with the transformation of private space. Bulbs, wiring, textiles, dyes and bolts intertwine, carrying the fragility of livable spaces. The reality is thus diverted, revealing the ephemeral aspect of a memory that fades with the renewal of the domestic sphere.
Trace consists of three installations: L, V and S. The concept of flexibility and mobility is the basis of the work that thus adapts to its exhibition space. The development is based on a collective "work-in-progress" methodology, where each element responds to the first and influences the next.
My work investigates our relationship to the constructed environment. During my lifetime, I successively lived in the countryside, the suburbs and in the city. Regularly, I still commute between these three distinctive locales. I witnessed the characteristic urban development of the northern suburbs of Montreal through the eyes of a child, a teenager and those of a young artist. At each step of my life, I had a different perspective on this constant construction site. These different ways of perceiving the constructed environment overlap and tie together in an ironic and playful mode within my practice.
My work is constructed from fabricated, recuperated and hijacked elements, materials that are familiar and evokes the everyday architecture. I build hybrid structures from rudimentary elements, often archaic, but activated with modern technologies as computers and electronics. My sculptural work is intimately linked to the usage of mechanics and media technologies. This strategy induces movement of a structure that evoke static monolithic objects. The mixing of technologies and materials, which reference everyday life objects, gives a hybrid and playful aspect to my work. This strategy leads the spectator to construct a new narrative. Ones given a familiar reference point, viewers inventively create links with their own everyday perception of the constructed environment.
The space occupied by my installations goes beyond their own materiality. It always involves time. Sound and mechanical movement expands the simple object quality of the work. Monumentality of the installation space immerses the spectator and asks to physically engage with the scale of the piece.
(...) It is precisely this irreversible movement from birth towards death that objects help us to cope with. (...) These mechanisms, with the disappearance of the old religious and ideological authorities, are becoming the consolation of consolations, the everyday mythology absorbing all the angst that attends time, that attends death. (...) AUTOMATISM, is the major concept of the modern object’s mechanistic triumphalism, the ideal of its mythology. (Jean Baudrillard: The System of objects)
The historical and sacred nature of the art object blends with the fetish of technologies. The kinetic nature driving each installation answers its own logic. My work seeks to destabilize the illusory notion of one’s power over his techne. The installation aims to confront the spectator’s incapacity to control seemingly functional objects. These multifunctional autonomous objects reflect one’s role in a technical society, that of the perfect ‘all-purpose’ object, that of an instrumental model. Pseudo functionality, coupled with the formal aspects of the objects, refers to the idea of the gadget, the ‘thing-a-madgig’, a thing of a vague utility, without limit, with an imaginary functionality.
Education
2006-2009 : MFA Studio Arts, Open-Media, Concordia University.
2000-2004 : BFA, UQÀM
Solo Exhibitions
2009 : Musée d’Art Contemporain des Laurentides, St-Jérôme, Canada. Détournement d’objets direct, installation.
2008 : Galerie Art Mûr, Montréal, Canada. Trace, installation collective en trois temps L / V / S, installation
in collaboration with Sofian Audry.
Performances
2008 : Usine C, Montréal, Canada. Grace State Machines, robotic performance in collaboration with Bill Vorn & Emma Howes.
2008 : Maison des métallos, Paris, France. Grace State Machines, idem.
2008 : Festival 404, Trieste, Italie. Grace State Machines, idem.
2007 : Festival Subtle Technologies, Toronto, Canada. Grace States Machines, idem.
2005 : HKS (Hordaland Kunst Center), Bergen, Norway. Drone, video performance.
Group Exhibitions
2008 : Festival 404, Trieste, Italie. Trace L, installation in collaboration with Sofian Audry.
2007 : Galerie Expression, St-Hyacinthe, Canada. Trace V, installation in collaboration with Sofian Audry.
2007 : Galerie Expression, St-Hyacinthe, Canada. Abysse, installation in collaboration with Sofian Audry.
2007 : Galerie 1313, Toronto, Canada. Trace L, installation, idem.
2007 : Musée d’Art Contemporain des Laurentides, St-Jérôme, Canada. Trace L, idem.
2005 : HKS (Hordaland Kunst Center), Bergen, Norvège. Travel Agent, installation, in collaboration with Sofian Audry, Mathieu Guindon, Samuel St-Aubin, Julien Keable & S.O.U.P
2005 : Galerie de L’UQAM, Montréal, Canada. Cube, video installation.
2004 : Galerie de l’UQAM, Montréal, Canada. La Station, installation.
2003 : Galerie de l’UQAM, Montréal, Canada. Réflexion, installation.
Residencies
2005 : Piksel Festival, BEK (Bergen Electronic Kunst Center), Bergen, Norway.
Grant & Distinctions
2008 : Grant Jeunes artistes en arts visuels des Laurentides.
2008 : Travel grant, Canada art council, forTrace L & Grace State Machines au Festival 404,
Trieste, Italie.
2007 : Travel grant, Conseil des Arts et des lettres du Québec, forTrace at Galerie 1313, Toronto, Canada.
2007 : Grants to New Media and Audio Artists: Research and Production Grants , Canada art council, forTrace
2006 : Student grant : Tuition Remission Fees Award. MFA Concordia University.
2005 : Grant Robert Wolf, Galerie de l’UQÀM, for Cube.
2004 : Grant Discreet Logic, Galerie de l’UQÀM, for La Station.
2003 : Mention, fondation McAbbie, Galerie de l’UQÀM, for Réflexion.
Relevant Experience
2008- ... : Board member of CQAM (Conseil québécois des arts médiatiques).
2007- ... : Board member Perte de signal.
2008 : Teaching assistant for Éric Raymond, UQÀM.
2008: Teaching assistant for Peter Flemming, Concordia University.
2006-2008 : Research assistant de Bill Vorn, Université Concordia.
2004-2006 : Assistant to implementation and operation of HEXAGRAM UQAM research-creation institute in new media art
Artist Talks
2008 : Concordia University, Montréal, Canada.
2007 : Festival Subtle Technologies, Toronto, Canada.
2005 : Galerie de L’UQÀM, Montréal, Canada.
Suggestions of artistes and organizations web sites
Audrey Samson ( Ideacritik )
