Séripop: The Face Stayed East, the Mouth Went West
Montreal-based artist duo Séripop (Yannick Desranleau and Chloe Lum) is known for temporary installations that respond playfully and critically to the built environment. The 50th anniversary of the opening of Confederation Centre of the Arts is an occasion for the reconsideration of the architecture of the complex through exhibitions, research, and sculptural installations. Accordingly, Séripop was invited to create The Face Stayed East, the Mouth Went West as a timely response to the Centre’s past and present. The work heightens attention to the physical details of the building complex while creating an immersive space of colour and surface that contrasts intensely with the unadorned formality and purity of the architecture. The artists deliberately make use of flexible materials with connotations of use, performance, and ornament-coloured paper, digital imagery, scaffolding, as well as the tactic of “quoting” the building’s layout and appearance in order to activate and open a space for critical reflection on the ostensibly self-sufficient and permanent “concrete bubble” of the architecture.
-Pan Wendt, Curator
