Collections Detail – MAC Montréal

Artist: Valérie Blass
Title: Cargo-Culte
Dimensions and medium: Metal, plaster, and various materials and objects, 213 × 116 × 120 cm (overall)
Artwork description: This sculptural assemblage by Valérie Blass includes both found objects and fabricated elements. Resting on a plinth covered in printed fabric, a series of metal rods joined together at right angles create a kind of ramified structure. At the ends of these rods are random objects purchased at a flea market in Switzerland, and painted plaster hands cast by the artist. Some of these hold a nutcracker in the shape of a nude woman, a black comb, a cigar, and a plastic eye extracted from a toy. Valérie Blass’s art practice straddles two traditional approaches to sculpture. On one hand, collected, recycled and transformed objects of all kinds become an exercise in assemblage and bricolage. On the other, her work resembles a more classical, figurative sculpture, where the statue, the monument, the bust, and the pedestal form the basis of her formal vocabulary. The strength of her work lies in its ability to attract the viewer and to stimulate the mind’s powers of association.

Valérie Blass