Églantine et Arum, 2018

Marie Labat  

Drawing on graphic tablet, water inkjet printing on 233 Deco Trevira CS polyester. 144 × 90 cm and 144 × 100 cm with the wooden support allowing the suspension of the piece. Numbered edition of 2 copies. The farmer takes on the features of Israel Galvan, a flamenco dancer. In his show La Curva he dances the movement and evolution of Flamenco. Marie Labat used her image, her movements and elements of the show. The farmer keeps his attributes, boots stained with white liquid, a reference to milk production, but also as a symbol of life and transmission. The compositions highlight the current context of destructive agro-food, at the human, social and environmental levels. The peasant needs to rethink his relationship to the world based on his roots and his rites. Wild flowers are his accomplices in this quest. The elements present in the compositions are fragments of images borrowed from different social and environmental contexts or symbolic figures in the history of art. They are assembled by associations of ideas, thought of as cause and effect, starting from a milieu and its exchanges with the world. For the artist, the fabric refers to the tapestries used to underline the authority of the hosts in their territory and beyond by the composition of a symbolic narration. For her, it is also a printing medium that evokes Japanese painting, Jakuch among others, representing nature and animals on textiles. The material is sensitive, soft, intimate and light. The artist expresses the position of the character, farmer dancer, pillar of the challenges of change, caught between natural gentleness and shaped authority.