Le passage, 2011

Éric Théret  

For Éric Théret, monumentality is never an end in itself. It is not the expression of power or heroic impulse, but the result of a slow and demanding dialogue between the human hand and the age-old material. In his granite works – notably, a series of arches weighing up to 18 tons – an almost metaphysical tension is established between the density of the material and the lightness of the sculptural gesture. Théret does not tame the stone; he questions it, crosses it, listens to it.

At the crossroads of megalithic sculpture traditions and contemporary experiments with space, his work shares an implicit connection with the Carnac menhirs as much as with Naum Gabo's "Spatial Constructions." But where Gabo uses emptiness as an extension of volume, Théret uses mass to reveal emptiness: the space between the arches, the interstices left open, become thresholds, places of passage in both a symbolic and physical sense.

His approach is reminiscent of Richard Serra's, in the idea that sculpture is an environment to inhabit, not an object to contemplate. But unlike Serra, whose steel plates impose a form of physical intimidation, Théret instead opens doors in the material. He doesn't close off space: he invites it in. Granite, heavy and opaque, becomes a breathing medium for him.

In his glass paste collaborations with Daum, we find this same obsession with the passage, light, and memory of the elements. Glass, as opposed to granite, completes Théret's visual alphabet: transparency versus opacity, fluidity versus solidity. A dialectic that could be read as a discreet echo of the work of Giuseppe Penone, and more broadly of Arte Povera, in their shared desire to reconnect with the world's raw materials.

Éric Théret's work then poses this essential question: what can sculpture still do in the era of the virtualization of reality? His answer is clear: it can still anchor. In a volatile world, his stones hold firm. They mark the territory, offer landmarks. Not monuments to the past, but foundations for perception.