Remai Modern presents largest North American exhibition to date by Laure Prouvoust
For immediate release — June 26, 2023
SASKATOON, CANADA — This month, visitors to Remai Modern are invited to explore the surprising, enveloping and often unusual world of artist Laure Prouvost. Oma-je, an exhibition of some of the artist’s most iconic works alongside a large-scale new commission, is her largest exhibition to date in North America.
Oma-je is a solo exhibition that focuses on what is passed from one generation to another, from artist to artist, from mother to child, and by humans to other living beings with whom we share the planet. In the exhibition, she pays homage to her artistic predecessors, including John Latham and Louise Bourgeois. She also includes works by female Saskatchewan artists in Remai Modern’s collection.
“Laure adds depth and personal connections to this exhibition through inclusion of works that are significant both to her career as an artist and to the place in which this exhibition is being presented,” said Aileen Burns, Co-Executive Director & CEO of Remai Modern and the exhibition’s curator. “Her focus on the grandmother figure provides a further touchpoint that visitors can connect to. The title of the show — pronounced homage — is a nod to the oma, grandmother, nana, grand-mère, and je, me, myself, the artist. The grandmothering celebrated in this exhibition is a verb, a practice of care, of mentorship, and of knowledge transfer rather than heredity or biology.”
Prouvost is known for her playful use of language, translation and transliteration, experimental narrated video, and immersive and surprising installations that transport visitors into unfamiliar worlds created largely from everyday objects. The exhibition includes well-known pieces by Prouvost such as Grandma’s Dream (2013), End Is Her Story (2017), This Means (2019), and Four For See Beauties (2022).
This Means, a Murano glass sculpture depicting an octopus figure, was recently purchased for Remai Modern’s collection. With breasts for eyes, this octopus leaks the water (emotion) that is essential for life, and holds in her hands a bottle of milk, a glass (mother), an orange (love), a nail brush (excited), and a flat spanner (father). She carries a vast array of responsibilities and does many things at once.
Oma-je also includes an immersive newly commissioned work titled Here her heart hovers (2023), which premieres simultaneously at Remai Modern and Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna. This installation focuses on the figure of the grandmother as an ancestor and trailblazer. The work transforms the gallery into a theatre of object relating to memory, imagination, and inheritance. Visitors will be invited to travel through time and lose themselves in the dark, complex play between past and present, individual and society, and between modern and ancient concepts, relationships, materials and techniques. This commission is made up of nine new pieces including three videos, all on view for the first time.
Prouvost and Burns will discuss the exhibition during an opening talk on Thursday, June 29 at 8 PM. The artist will also conduct a French-language tour of the exhibition on the following day at 2 PM.
Remai Modern would like to acknowledge the contributions of the Frank & Ellen Remai Foundation and the Consulate General of France in Vancouver for supporting this exhibition.
About the Laure Prouvost
Laure Prouvost was born in Lille, France (1978) and is currently based in Brussels. She received her BFA from Central St Martins, London in 2002 and studied towards her MFA at Goldsmiths College, London. She also took part in the LUX Associate Programme. Prouvost won the MaxMara Art Prize for Women in 2011 and was the recipient of the Turner Prize in 2013.
About Remai Modern
Remai Modern is situated on Treaty 6 Territory and the Traditional Homeland of the Métis. We pay our respects to First Nations and Métis ancestors and reaffirm our relationship with one another.
Remai Modern is a new museum of modern and contemporary art in Saskatoon. The museum presents and collects local and international modern and contemporary art that connects, inspires and challenges diverse audiences through equitable and accessible programs.
Open since October 2017, Remai Modern is the largest contemporary art museum in western Canada and houses a collection of more than 8,000 works, including the world’s foremost collection of Picasso linocut prints.
Remai Modern would like to acknowledge the contributions of the Frank & Ellen Remai Foundation, the Canada Council for the Arts, SaskCulture through the Sask Lotteries Fund, SK Arts and the City of Saskatoon.
For additional information contact:
Stephanie McKay, Communications Manager
smckay@remaimodern.org
306.975.2242