Laboratoire 2003-2004
Anne Cartel - 2004 - translation by Déborah Lennie-Bisson
« Refuse yourself nothing »
A cacophony of forms, of colours, small formats juxtaposed and superimposed as one single entity, as one single painting.
A painting of multiple particles, its pictural diversity troubles our interpretation, and any possible discovery of a given meaning.
« Refuse yourself nothing » these were the instructions Jacques Morhaim gave to himself at the outset of this « laboratory » of forms. For him it was a way of continuing to question his relation to the world as a painter.
He considers this work as a sort of fracture. A rupture with his former position with regards to painting as the rule, the law : compose the content of the painting through geometric elements and colours determined by chance.
Chance as a sort of rule. He decided « to deregulate and explode the old machine, with the intention of constructing a new one. A subversive and unpredictable machine, free to face the world and express singularity. » ( J.M)
It is a question therefore of breaking the system of old painting, breaking its geometry, thereby enabling a return to image, gesture, where intuition and hazard take the place of « controlled » chance.
Systematization gives way to the heterogeneity of abstract or figurative forms. One rule only, considered as the homogenous element of the series : the size. 22cm high by 16cm wide.
The manner in which the paintings are displayed presents the series as one unfinishable painting : 126 paitings in one, by the main effect of flatness.
And then, approaching the painting, the discovery of a painting which in fact is not a painting since aluminium, perspex, wood, material and mirrors are also used, each element retaining its plastic qualities.
These forms are like recollections or details of modern and contemporary art history.
Firstly Jaques Morhaim’s resources : Piet Mondrian’s rigour, Kasimir Malevitch’s square, taken up and then destabilised. Others suggest Daniel Bunren’s lines, the gestuality of abstract expressionists, the matter of minimal art, but also references to his own work.
Others seem mixed, intertwined and yet essential to the elaboration of his work. The outcome is a dialogued argument between forms, a certain indecision and at the same time an optimism in this profusion, like an open, unfinished debate.
Because the difficulty which presents itself to Jaques Morhaim is that of how to continue painting, while fully assuming these references to art history. He choses to lay them out before him, taking them on and then continue on his way.