Details:

This painting depicts an otherworldly ecosystem that is frighteningly evocative of our planet's bleak condition and its volatile environment. This work suggests a vision of the future built on the remnants of today’s industrialized society.
Unframed

① Artwork:

Gatekeepers

This painting depicts an otherworldly ecosystem that is frighteningly evocative of our planet's bleak condition and its volatile environment. The artist's work suggests a vision of the future built on the remnants of today’s industrialized society—with mutant flora, overgrown invasive species, rusting motor parts collecting silt in lake beds and living tissue merging with electronic circuitry. Amidst this refuse, flowing shapes reminiscent of parasitic plants or cancerous cells proliferate.

Guillaume Dénervaud uses stencils and templates he has collected to render dense forests of organic and engineered forms. The artist uses templates ranging from traditional architectural French curves and various ellipses to branded stencils used by real estate agents and furniture designers to sketch diverse industrial elements—the curve of a wall, the shape of bathroom fixtures, plumbing, electrical wiring, etc. As CAD has made these tools mostly obsolete for commercial use, Dénervaud redeploys them to create new anticipatory scenarios of dystopian landscapes and scenes that seem more like disrupted habitats than deliberate plans.

Specs:

18.13 inches
29.5 inches

③ Artist:

Guillaume Dénervaud

Drawing influence from dystopian eco-fiction, Dénervaud’s work depicts dense forests of organic and engineered forms—simultaneously otherworldly and also frighteningly evocative of our volatile environment. To create these scenes' industrial forms, the artist uses stencils and templates collected from diverse sources, including architecture, real estate and furniture design. Dénervaud uses ink and oil paint made from plants, algae and minerals to render the organic forms, flowing shapes reminiscent of parasitic plants or proliferating cancerous cells.

BIO:

Guillaume Dénervaud was born in Fribourg, Switzerland in 1987. The artist studied illustration at the École des arts appliqués in Geneva, Switzerland and at HEAD, also in Geneva.

Solo exhibitions of Dénervaud’s work include: Surv’eye at Centre D’édition Contemporary (CEC) in Geneva, Switzerland (2021); Zone Furtive at Balice Hertling in Paris, France (2019); Inversens Clinic at Alienze in Lausanne, Switzerland (2019); and Spectrolia Corporation at Hard Hat in Geneva, Switzerland (2018).

Group exhibitions that have shown Dénervaud’s work include: Des corps, des écritures at Musée d’art Moderne de la Ville de Paris in France (2022); Aquarium at Maison Populaire in Montreal, Canada (2022); Les formes du transfet at Les Magasins Généraux in Paris, France (2021); Emblazoned World at Bel Ami in Los Angeles, California (2021); Le sain ennui at BQ gallery in Berlin, Germany (2021); Your Friends and Neighbors at High Art in Paris, France (2020); and L’Oranger at LiveInYourHead in Geneva, Switzerland (2017). 

In 2021, Dénervaud participated in the Swiss Institute residency program in New York City.

Dénervaud’s work is in the collections of the MAMCO in Geneva, Switzerland; and the collection of the Musée d’art Moderne de la Ville de Paris in France. 

Dénervaud lives and works in Paris, France.

Guillaume Dénervaud:
Gatekeepers, 2022
Acrylic and oil on patchwork canvas
29.5 × 18.1 inches /