Quentin Carnaille, born in Roubaix in 1984, is a french contemporary artist.

Biography

Raised in Roubaix near Lille, Quentin Carnaille has been seen as a promising creator as early as 2013 by Maisons de Mode —who put a boutique/workshop at his disposal—, he then took part in various exhibitions in Paris and abroad. While he was still a student in architecture, his first works were influenced by his fascination for clockwork mechanisms. At first diverted from their primary purpose and used in the manufacture of jewelry and accessories, these were quickly used by the artist as material to create actual sculptures each time bigger. Even if today Quentin Carnaille feels committed to contemporaneity or even futuristic ideas, his early work revolved around the past and our origins. The metaphysical dimension of his work accompanies a real reflection about art history. Indeed, the artist reinterprets some classics of western art to propose a new version. It is the case, for instance, with his anthropomorphic sculptures, designed as an obvious reference to Giacometti. In this regard, some of Quentin Carnaille’s works should be seen as influenced by postmodernism. This approach is also enhanced as the artist makes his the concept of found objects or ready-made. With Garde-Temps, a watch that does not give the time, he transforms a manufactured object with a specific function into a work of art delivering a poetic speech on time and its relativity. Apparition, unveiled at Art Up! in 2015, also contributes to developing new issues in the artist’s work. The watch parts, no longer held together by magnets, are trapped in ice. The transformation of matter, of water into ice, is an allegory of time. Apparition, in a certain way symbolising the ephemeral nature of the work of art, is above all a radical demonstration of the destruction of the object in the artist’s work. Therefore, this sculpture foreshadowed an important renewal of Quentin Carnaille’s practice, now oriented towards a form of conceptual minimalism fully illustrated by Introspection.

Work

Introspection, his last installation, resumes the founding notions of Quentin Carnaille’s work, while taking a more conceptual turn. The artist builds an installation operating as a system based on the dialogue between its different parts.

Four identical columns are topped by levitating cubes. Like in his previous works, Quentin Carnaille uses magnets, whose forces maintain the weight of these volumes a few centimetres above the columns. The latter, juxtaposed and strictly similar, underscore the idea of uniformity. Yet, each of them develops a special dialogue with a unique three-dimensional composition hung on the wall. For the artist, each of these frames is a mental representation of the column to which it is associated. In other words, it symbolises its individuality or singularity. The viewer is first seized by an effect of mass and repetition that gradually thins when one comes to interpret the compositions on the wall. Through this installation, Quentin Carnaille seeks to illustrate the paradox of human nature: a universal whole composed of singularities. Introspection evokes conscience, deep thought and the existence of the soul. The mind, dissociated from the body, is projected into a world unique and unfathomed. As though they were symbols for human beings, the columns incite the curious visitors to circulate within the installation, to finally settle. The installation thus invites the viewers to involve physically and also to participate mentally. Since his debut, the artist has oriented his work in this direction, to question the viewers and make them think. Introspection leads to self-examination while encouraging a broader meditation on mankind and its origins.

Already known for his creations and sculptures made from watch fragments, Quentin Carnaille, from 2010 to 2015, then developed various sculptural works that sometimes belonged to abstract, sometimes to figurative art. Clockwork pieces are assembled according to a logic of accumulation that reminds of Nouveau Réalisme. When seen from afar, the works appear as single objects, whereas when seen closely, they reveal that each one is composed of a multitude of old watches parts. Quentin Carnaille offers a demonstration about fragments forming a whole, like the functioning of a watch in which all the wheels rotate with one another. His art is designed to echo the organisation of nature and the universe. From the beginning, Quentin Carnaille has explored the concept of time through his art, and is now also interested in the notion of space, in how works of art take place in space. Some of his recent sculptures levitate thanks to magnetic experiments, but others —like Attraction (2015)— develop an in-depth rendering of space so that the spectator comprehends space better. Attraction marked a renewal in the artist’s practice, but today Introspection is an obvious breaking point. Indeed, it's the first piece by Quentin Carnaille which is totally devoid of clockwork parts. The installation combines sober aesthetics with the artist’s metaphysical thoughts. Like some social science-fiction novels, Introspection evokes the replaceability of humans. With these columns as black lacquered surfaces, Quentin Carnaille approaches a form of conceptual minimalism where the vacuum, omnipresent, tends to create a fourth dimension.