MÉLANIE BOUCHER |
Mélanie Boucher is full professor of museology and art history at the Université du Québec
en Outaoauis (UQO). She is the co-founder of the Groupe de recherche et de réflexion
Collections et impératif évènementiel/The Convulsive Collections (CIÉ/CO). She is research
director of Axis 3 (the expanded collection) of the Partnership for New Uses of Collections in
Art Museums (SSHRC 2021-2028) and director of the research-creation project Créer avec
les collections (FRQSC 2022-2026). Mélanie Boucher is also principal investigator of the
Équipe Art et musée, which brings together curators, artists and exhibition designers from
three Quebec universities, and principal investigator of the Groupe Origine et actualité du
devenir objet du sujet : se recréer au musée, dans les expositions (SSHRC 2021-2024).
LAURANNE FAUBERT-GUAY |
Lauranne is a transdisciplinary artist, trained in the visual arts, sociology and contemporary
dance. Lauranne conceives her artistic approach as a praxis, a philosophy in movement.
Sensitive to the urgent need to change our way of being-in-the-world, notably by adopting a
minimalist lifestyle, she is more specifically interested in the ascetic body and its capacity for
self-sufficiency. Her artistic work is a quest for empowerment, the core of which comprises
notions of ecology and autonomy. It is distinguished by a gestural style that is both gentle
and violent, at the crossroads of difficulty and emancipation, effort and satisfaction.
Since 2019, Lauranne has been supported by several arts institutions, including AXENÉO7,
Tangente Danse, Studio 303, LA SERRE - arts vivants, Circuit-Est centre chorégraphique,
Culture Outaouais and the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec, to carry out her
choreographic creations, which are presented in Montreal and the Outaouais region.
Finally, Lauranne is founder and director of Devenir(s) corps, an organization currently
developing a residency and practice space for the performing arts in Montpellier, in the
Outaouais region. Lauranne Faubert-Guay's intervention is a kind of "commentary-performative with a hypnotic flavour".
Devenirs corps will launch its first artistic programme in September 2023. The organisation's
mandate is to support, welcome and integrate local artists into each of its programs.
PIERRE-ANTOINE LAFON SIMARD |
A graduate of the University of Ottawa, the Conservatoire d'art dramatique de Québec and the National Theatre School of Canada, Pierre Antoine Lafon Simard is a director, sound
and video designer. From 2013-2016, he was assistant programmer at Usine C.
In 2014, he worked as a story consultant for the NFB Interactive and MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology). Since October 2016 he has been artistic director of Théâtre du Trillium and responsible for theatre and dance programming at La Nouvelle Scène. He has directed several productions, including Taram (2011), Déluge (2012), MILF (2017), Moon Mission (2018), Mon corps livré pour vous (2018), Néon Boréal (2019), Durant des années (2023) and IA: l'autre créateur (2023).
He has also worked on a number of sound and video
designs, including Jeff Koons, une conception spatiale et numérique en VR (2019), Demain,
j'étais ici: un parcours audio numérique (2021) and Le Virus et la proie (2023).
In 2020, he co-founded the Scène Nationale du Son, a digital space for the performing arts that gives voice to contemporary dramatic art, the works of which he co-directs.
MARC A. REINHARDT |
Marc A. Reinhardt ​​focuses on a practice at the intersection of writing, installation and
performance. He has presented works in Quebec, Canada, Europe and South America. He
has been a member of several collectives, including ACTION INDIRECTE and Kabane77,
and now runs Le Clinique, a small experimental publishing structure based in Hull. He lives
and works between Gatineau and Montreal.
To celebrate its 40th anniversary, AXENÉO7 is revisiting a key event from its thirtieth
anniversary program (2013): the Salons. A veritable artistic banquet, the Salons bring guest
artists together with the center's community over dinner, for a participatory discussion on a
specific subject, and to present research, performances and reflections, all in a convivial
atmosphere.
The Salons series consists of four events presented during each season of the 40th
programming year, between La Filature's backyard and the center's exhibition spaces, depending on the weather. These dinners are free and open to all.
For this first artistic dinner, the center invites Mélanie Boucher, Lauranne Faubert-Guay,
Pierre-Antoine Lafon Simard and Marc A. Reinhardt to discuss the theme of interpretation. ​​​​
In its most literal sense, the term alludes to performing arts practices, but also to the gesture
of reading, appropriation, compromise and translation. We can conceive of the gesture of
interpretation as an act of empowerment, agency and survival. Interpretation allows us to
bend rules, contexts and codes in order to transform them, make sense of them and make
them evolve.
Salon #1 is a Carte Blanche project by our partners at AXENÉO7.
Founded in 1983, AXENÉO7 is an artist-run centre dedicated to advocating, promoting, and
exhibiting the visual arts, while developing critical discourse around them. It is a gathering
place for sharing and experimentation. Through a critically engaged program, it endeavours
to expand the parameters of artistic practice and its presentation, and to improve artists’
conditions for production.