Le Loup en Nous: A solo project at the Centre de la Gravure et de l’Image imprimée, Belgium 2018

Le Loup En Nous : Centre de la Gravure et de l’Image imprimée, Belgium. A solo project within OVERPR!NT curated by Jean Pierre Muller. From 28th April to 16 September 2018

The museum invited Leigh Clarke to interact with communities in the city of La Louvière through a collaborative print activity. Following recent public arts projects, the question continued asking whether print as an artefact or process is able to unite people and bring new audiences into art and design spaces.

The Centre de la Gravure et de l’image imprimée is a world leading museum in Belgium focussing specifically on the printed image. Solo exhibitions there have included Pablo Picasso, Luc Tuymans and David Lynch.

In April 2018, one museum space was curated by the Head of Print at La Cambre University Brussels and leader of the International Print Union. The museum exhibited works under the title OVERPR!NT, made by artists associated with the International Print Union from the RCA, CSM, Royal Academy Antwerp and Hochscule fur Grafik und Buchkunst Leipzig.

Following an ERASMUS trip through LCC to La Cambre, I delivered a lecture on my practice which led to Professor Muller asking me to exhibit a solo exhibition within the project. Within OVERPR!NT, The Museum displayed my printed works and projects from over the past 10 years. They exhibited some works on a wall next the work of Barbara Kruger and Marcel Broodthears. They asked me to create a printed outcome as a result of working with people in La Louvière and a limited edition print.

I generated an edition of 1200 lithographs funded by LCC with a added screen printed phosphorescent ink. The image in the centre of a wolf referenced their inhabitance the city in the 12th century. Wolves have returned to Wallonia after 120 years with a growing population.

For the project I considered similarities in the characteristics of a wolf and a poster. A poster’s ability to stalk, encounter and communicate over long distances, assembles packs of people to participate in activity. It raises the alarm, rallies and gathers communities. Unlike social networking, the speed at which the poster communicates is physically interactive, changing the breathing space around the person or environment it operates in. The way it positions itself in public spaces is territorial, it can appear anywhere, altering perceptions with its gregarious presence.

Through interaction and participation, the project poster functioned in unifying and celebrating public groups that regularly meet in the City of La Louviere. It also acted as an invitation to join us at the museum to view the politically inspired works made through print media.

The museum organised groups of communities within the city to have their photograph taken, each individually holding a poster together in their group. We then turned off the lights, allowing the posters to glow. The results of the shoots were exhibited at the museum. Each participant was given a limited edition print and an invitation to the private view. Many participants, many who had never visited the museum, attended the private view and saw themselves in the work.

• Organisation
• https://www.antennecentre.tv/www/la_louv...