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January 31, 2011 – Review
Michel François at kamel mennour, Paris
Chris Sharp
Upon first glance, an erotic reading of Michel François’s work might at seem a bit unorthodox, but with all the tension, indexes of expenditure, and sheer materiality coursing through his first solo show in Paris, such a reading is, at least in part, inevitable. For while the Belgian Brussels-based artist is primarily known for his preoccupations with contamination, physics (gravity and magnetism) and teleological processes as incarnated in plastic forms, the body, it seems, is never far from what he does. Its presence is sensually lurking, both literally and metaphorically, but never without a touch of absurdity among the thirteen works on view here.
Some of the most literal examples of this would include Contamination, (2006) and Instant Gratification, (2010). The first is comprised of three pairs of wooden apples, which have been partially carbonized, collocated together, dragged across a broad expanse of wall at different heights, and then nailed there—their traces blackly blazing behind them like testimonies to the shared sin of carnal communion and consequent exhaustion. Resembling a round silver splotch, the ironically titled Instant Gratification is the byproduct of incrementally poured aluminum, whose resultant integer is then hung on the wall. The melted metal is as suggestive of …