La conversation
La conversation
1998
70x70 Huile sur bois

details



The Conversation deals with a landscape a dream-like, unbelievable one. The codes of perspective are blurred. Of course there are a foreground, a skyline and a sky, but there is no mark to measure out the depth of field.

A dark-watered pond pierces the landscape the night has pervaded its water. Even in broad daylight, the pond keeps shadows of this nocturnal substance, this substantial darkness. It becomes dark as a marsh. Hideous birds live there, throwing their feathers as if they were arrows, thus devastating the fruits on the ground, and revelling in human flesh. Bachelard also deals with La mer des ténèbres, which spreads terror through sailors. The depth, that gives water its ink black colour, is the receptacle of our nocturnal terrors.
When, through a copper-coloured, reddening light, the sun rises, one can note desolation bodies are lying directly on the rock; a greenish animal is spitted on a branch; a hideous fish is emerging from an abyss. Two white-robed characters are in a one-to-one conversation. Behind them, a coarsely dressed man is leaning on a rock, a candle lit on his head. In front of them, a human being is walking with a child-cat clung on his back, while a gnome is holding a pig on a leash. An animal wearing an armour is facing a porcupine, who is standing on his cock's legs. A bear cub is showing his whiteness around.
A flow of vegetation is pouring down from a mountain summit, a leafed lava flow that ends in a wincing face.
As much as the earthly density is significant, the sky is getting an immaterial aspect. Silvery clouds soften the sharp mountain peaks.