Maxime Le Bon

Odds & Ends

Project Info

  • 💙 Rue du Chapeau 10
  • 💚 Gevaert Edition
  • đŸ–€ Maxime Le Bon
  • 💜 Piero Bisello
  • 💛 Fabrice Schneider

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Installation view
Maxime Le Bon at Rue du Chapeau 10
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Maxime Le Bon, Death #2, 2020, oil and graphit on paper, 75 x 110 cm
Maxime Le Bon, Death #2, 2020, oil and graphit on paper, 75 x 110 cm
Maxime Le Bon, Flowers, 2022, ballpoint pen on paper, 16,5 x 21 cm
Maxime Le Bon, Flowers, 2022, ballpoint pen on paper, 16,5 x 21 cm
Maxime Le Bon, TchantchĂšs #3, 2021, oil and graphit on paper, 15 x 18 cm
Maxime Le Bon, TchantchĂšs #3, 2021, oil and graphit on paper, 15 x 18 cm
Maxime Le Bon, TchantchĂšs #4, 2021, oil and graphit on paper, 41 x 19 cm
Maxime Le Bon, TchantchĂšs #4, 2021, oil and graphit on paper, 41 x 19 cm
Maxime Le Bon, TchantchĂšs #5, 2022, oil and graphit on paper, 21,5 x 21,5 cm
Maxime Le Bon, TchantchĂšs #5, 2022, oil and graphit on paper, 21,5 x 21,5 cm
Maxime Le Bon, On the left: Puzzle, 2020, ink on paper, 21 x 29,7 cm In the middle: Demons, 2022, oil and graphit on paper, 6 x 6 cm On the right: :) , 2021, oil on paper, 17 x 30 cm
Maxime Le Bon, On the left: Puzzle, 2020, ink on paper, 21 x 29,7 cm In the middle: Demons, 2022, oil and graphit on paper, 6 x 6 cm On the right: :) , 2021, oil on paper, 17 x 30 cm
8. Maxime Le Bon, On the Left: Piece, 2021, oil on paper, 21 x 29,7 cm 2021 On the right: Column, 2022, inkjet print and ballpoint pen on paper, 21 x 29,7 cm
8. Maxime Le Bon, On the Left: Piece, 2021, oil on paper, 21 x 29,7 cm 2021 On the right: Column, 2022, inkjet print and ballpoint pen on paper, 21 x 29,7 cm
Maxime Le Bon, Bridge, 2022, oil, ink and graphit on paper, 6 x 6 cm
Maxime Le Bon, Bridge, 2022, oil, ink and graphit on paper, 6 x 6 cm
Maxime Le Bon, Monobloc, 2021, ink on paper, 24,5 x 34,5 cm
Maxime Le Bon, Monobloc, 2021, ink on paper, 24,5 x 34,5 cm
Maxime Le Bon, Comma #1, #2, #3, 2022, ink and ballpoint on paper, 3 X 15,5 x 21,5 cm
Maxime Le Bon, Comma #1, #2, #3, 2022, ink and ballpoint on paper, 3 X 15,5 x 21,5 cm
Maxime Le Bon, Line, 2022, ballpoint pen on paper, 15,5 x 21,5 cm
Maxime Le Bon, Line, 2022, ballpoint pen on paper, 15,5 x 21,5 cm
Maxime Le Bon, TchantchĂšs #4, 2022, oil and graphit on paper 21,5 x 21,5 cm
Maxime Le Bon, TchantchĂšs #4, 2022, oil and graphit on paper 21,5 x 21,5 cm
The drawings by Maxime Le Bon grouped together for his exhibition Odds & Ends at Rue Du Chapeau 10 make me think of a Japanese corporation–its inner workings, to be precise. The drawings aren’t in any way about a Japanese corporation. Rather, their apparent chaos-turned-coherent speaks to me about deeply structured things that we can’t structure from without, like a Japanese corporation; in the shoes of a Toyota worker, I'd be very familiar with the institution’s law and order, things alien to me if those shoes were off. Another point is whether I should care about someone else’s procedures. My attempted answer is that people end up drawn to things that are dramatically odd, like Odds & Ends. Pen marks shaping an abstracted flower bunch on a yellowed paper exist near a cutout page with ink gestures in its margins, and a skeleton. A jigsawed house mingles with a comma. Carnivalesque faces on the wall, skewed and textured, tie the room together. This is what Le Bon gives us, and I am sold. Someone, the artist, gave a fair amount of thought in first making and then joining these things–must not there be a reason, a rationale, an agenda? Le Bon’s selection of drawings invites you to seek meaning; the pictures and figures are minimally given to you, stripped, like signs–things that must signify when put together. Soaking them in, I feel close to those who uprooted ancient hieroglyphs, a language nobody had read for 3000 years. However, I suspect that the point of Odds & Ends is not to waste time interpreting. I am invited but I don’t attend, and that’s good enough. Even though there might be some sort of relevant truth in the mind of the artist, him who delivers it through a disparate selection of drawings, I want to keep the exhibition away from utilitarianism and believe it doesn’t want to teach me. It’s sufficient for me to experience that pleasing alienation of not being in Le Bon’s shoes, while guessing they exist, and they might even look smart. I am reminded of how psychologist ThĂ©odore Flournoy recalled a medium sĂ©ance and his spiritual interaction with Esenale, the main interpreter of Martian language in the early 20th century (according to him): Esenale has gone away ... he has left me alone ... but he will return, ... he will soon return. ... He has taken me by the hand and made me enter the house. ... I do not know where Esenale is leading me, but he has said to me, "Dode ne haudan te meche metiche Astane ke de me veche."1
Piero Bisello

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