Etienne Tilman (1999)

Au Finistère Espagnol, il existe un site où l’on peut croire voir du bois pétrifié sortant du sol. Marie-Noëlle Relecom s’est rendue dans cette région et elle s’est aperçue très vite par la forme et par la texture des éléments qu’il ne s’agissait ni de bois, ni de pierre mais d’ossements de grands cétacés rejetés par la mer au cours des derniers siècles. L’idée lui est venue de sauver ces matériaux en témoignage de son respect de la nature et des espèces vivantes. Dans le domaine de la sculpture, le choix du matériau n’est jamais innocent. Si l’idée prévaut sur la matière, le sculpteur choisira ce qui est le plus adéquat. Hors, depuis le quattrocento, le rôle de l’artiste était d’imposer son savoir par la maîtrise de la matière. C’était d’ailleurs principalement sur ce critère que les amateurs d’art jugeaient de la manière ou, plus communément aujourd’hui, du style de l’artiste. Au XXème siècle, les artistes sont sortis des ateliers et du « système des Beaux-Arts », pour s’intéresser non seulement à l’univers qu’ils créent mais aussi au monde déjà créé qui les entoure. L’acte de sculpter s’en est trouvé profondément modifié et la forme de certains objets trouvés s’est imposée telle quelle aux artistes.

Like stone sculptors , who on discouvering a fossil in its block of stone , see that this inert matter contains a proof of life , Marie-Noêlle de la Poype very quickly became aware of significiance contained in the smallest part of the skeleton of a large cetacean. The coming together of individual mythologies with a potential for triggering awareness that such a meeting provokes will always generate a whole host of thoughts as deep as the majestic ocanic abysses. Marie-Noêlle de la Poype is conscious of the perception we have of these animals and the elements struck her both through their materiality and their form . Her artistic action is thus concentrated on reification trough an assembly of certain parts of a whole ,in order to bring to life a new organic object with meaning. Her sensitivity leads her to adopt various approaches . When the specificity of the material is dominant , her approach is to apply a transparant colouring . Form and size are also often perceived as potential messages . And interprétations in plaster, aluminium or bronze of certain forms and structures also serve the discourse of MNdlP in her overall project of senerity. She sometimes makes modifications by eliminating material when an object is too time-worm ,so that it no longer evokes the animal of which it used to form part , and its new intrinsic existence is then given through a revelation of the form it already bore, but too secretly.

Other discoverles on the shores of Patagonia underpin her approach . The assemblies of bones are not lying on a plinth or metallic stand , but on a stone.The mineral element put in relation with the most lasting remains of the largest animal from the blue planet puts us in the presence of a solid and visual secular memory . Earth and sea are présent before us.

The lava stone comes from the centre of the earth , certain minerals reveal their geographical origin , others have energetic properties , and meteorites , for their part, are testimonles of the universe . All these stones picked up here and there , in the course of her travels , are put in relation with one another through assemblies with the bones of the largest ,the most majestic , but also the most enigmatic animals known anywhere in the universe . These mineral and organic works will transport you into the secrets of the universe that cath woman carries in the deepest part of herself : genesis.

Etienne Tilman