Bernar Venet

« -  Not Virtual.

-  Without illusion.

-  Without appearance.

-  Nor metaphor.

-  Self-referential.  »

Bernar Venet

This poem of five verses by Bernar Venet serves as a

statement. In four négations and one affirmation, the

artist describes himself as well as the body of his work in

its entirety. To paraphrase Raymond Queneau, we might

see in this a small portable côsmology connecting the

part (the poem, the painting, or the film) with the whole.

Moreover, if we weigh the range of forms his artistic

expression has taken, we cannot help but recognize both

the intellectual discipline Venet has subjected himself to,

and the great coherence that underpins-his oeuvre, from

its early days to the present.