Born to a geologist father, the designations igneous, metamorphic or sedimentary rock lulled my childhood with his professional appetite.
Read moreTo me, these words, and the time immemorial activity they name, embody my father’s hard core, and the hindsight instilled in him by a singular awareness of duration, at odds with my playful energy as a child, then with my contemporary art activity anchored in the present.
My father grew up in Abitibi-Témiscamingue, a region whose colonization was encouraged by the provincial government in the early 20th century. From a modest background, he aspired to become a geologist to counter the exploitation of relatives and fellow citizens by mining companies. As part of his graduate studies, he mapped a part of Labrador known to the Innu as Nitassinan, and led teams of geologists in field exploration for Iron Ore of Canada, operator of the Schefferville mines until 1982.
His post-graduate studies in mineral engineering and the development of specialized expertise in geological structures specific to the Quebec territory – the Cadillac Fault in Abitibi-Témiscamingue, the Labrador Trough and the Monteregian Hills near Montreal – represent for him so many attempts to take charge of his own destiny, in reaction to a financial oligarchy, often English-speaking, to which his birth and family condition have subjected him.
However, he came into the world on “mined” ground. The dawn of his life and the beginnings of his scientific career bear witness to power dynamics still at work today. Canada is a leader in the global mining industry, with the majority of companies exploiting deposits all over the planet, registered here because of a mining law regime of convenience. Canadians and Quebecers alike, through their government, are investing in this sector of activity, and in the social project it is creating from behind the scenes. My father’s field of expertise serves this extractive activity, supported in our name but now much criticized. The art world and museums remain dependent on the patrons who have made their fortunes there.
In this respect, the mining industry constitutes a singular cultural territory, made up of brand images and little-known realities, militancy and citizen mobilization, as well as a nebula of collateral damage. My father’s youth, his family history and my own accounts of it, bear witness to this context marked by colonization, exploration and exploitation of the land, as well as by the imaginary world surrounding these activities. These zones of light and shadow have long shaped my perception of the world. My exposure to and analysis of contemporary works of visual art have revealed this more ideological heritage than I first realized.
Moving back and forth between yesterday and today, I explore, through family memories and archival documents, this piece of land to which I was thrown by the chance of my birth. Here, I turn to my own micro-culture and the territory that shapes it.