Perrotin New York is pleased to present Compass, a solo project by French artist Xavier Veilhan. The works on view focus on the artist’s interest in geometry, including a new series of line drawings, graphic mobiles, small wooden sculptures and a marquetry, as well as a site-specific mural of hand drawn circles on the walls of the gallery. The drawings on paper will be completed during the public opening on February 28th at 5pm, marking Veilhan’s first live drawing session in the United States.
Over the last three decades, Xavier Veilhan has developed a multi-form approach to sculpture, painting, performance, video, and photography, often generating installations in which the audience becomes an active participant. Known primarily for his figurative sculptures and conceptual paintings, he has developed his own formal vocabulary, reinterpreting classical sculptural and architectural elements under a technological gaze. Utilizing geometrical figures and mathematical designs, the artist conceptualizes the living world through an analytical perspective.
In the exhibition, we are welcomed by the form of Alice n°2, the only marquetry on view. Combining the digital and the material, Veilhan attempts to capture the familiar likeness of the human figure through a modernistic perspective. The structural geometric form poised against a neutral background questions our understanding of classical portraiture, as Alice exists separate from physical representation of the real world.
The core of Compass consists of a series of new drawings in a variety of circular shapes and scales. For years, the artist has utilized drawing as a method for research and communication, which is now at the heart of his practice. In 2020, Veilhan began exploring the possibilities of a single line on paper in his Confinement drawings. These new works will expand his interest beyond the paper, creating an illusion of infinite space.
The core of Compass consists of a series of new drawings in a variety of circular shapes and scales. For years, the artist has utilized drawing as a method for research and communication, which is now at the heart of his practice. In 2020, Veilhan began exploring the possibilities of a single line on paper in his Confinement drawings. These new works will expand his interest beyond the paper, creating an illusion of infinite space.
Hanging from the ceiling, mobiles mimic the geometric motions of his drawings. Shadows of these works dance along the walls, their movement determined by interaction with visitors passing through the space.
The two wooden sculptures in the presentation are placed at eye level on wooden supports, allowing visits to consider them within the scale of their surroundings. The Marc sculpture, in the likeness of a musician at work, is a portrait of Veilhan's friend, Marc Tessier du Cros, as well as an archetypal representation of a guitarist that was inspired by Neil Young's pose on the cover of his Greatest Hits album. The surrounding circles from the on-site mural appear to be waves propagating the implicit sound.
Drawn directly on the walls of the space, Veilhan has created a site-specific mural with a large-scale rod compass which the artist produced for the project. Multiple repeated circles frame each two-dimensional line drawing, extending his works on paper into the three-dimensional space of the gallery. Veilhan’s Compass becomes not only a literal tool for drawing circles, but a metaphor for finding one's bearings in space.
Born in 1963 in Lyon, France
Lives and works in Paris, France
Xavier Veilhan has since the late 1980s created an acclaimed body of work inspired by both formal classicism and high technology, including a range of mediums (sculpture, painting, installation, performance, video, and photography). His exhibitions question our perception and often generate an evolving ambulatory space in which the audience becomes an actor. For example, in Veilhan Versailles (2009), his series Architectones (2012-2014) or his proposition for the French Pavilion at the Biennale di Venezia, titled Studio Venezia (2017).
Xavier Veilhan’s work is often showcased in the public space, with sculptures occupying numerous cities across France and abroad, including Paris, Stockholm, New York, Shanghai and Seoul, among others.
His work has been shown in various acclaimed institutions across the world, such as the Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris), Mamco (Geneva), the Phillips Collection (Washington), Mori Art Museum (Tokyo), and MAAT (Lisbon).
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