Archaeology of the gaze

Galerie Éclats art contemporain, Montreal

September 10 to October 10, 2026

Opening on September 10, 2026, RSVP

The works presented in the exhibition stem from a slow excavation, an inner archaeology where stone becomes simultaneously matter, memory, and perception. Menhirs, stelae, asteroid fragments, sculpted cliffs, Shiva's lingam... Since time immemorial, humanity has projected onto rock a presence that transcends the material's mere tangible nature. Stone traverses civilizations like a silent core around which beliefs, fears, and attempts to understand the world and the universe revolve.

Bertrand Licart's work is part of this quest, at the crossroads of introspection and active contemplation.

The Bic pen... a commonplace, almost humble tool... becomes an instrument of sedimentation.
Layer upon layer, the blue asserts itself, intensifies; it creates darkness, without, however, obscuring the light. The paper is no longer a surface but a space for immersion, a place of mental excavation, a form of self-hypnosis where moments of uncertainty, remnants of gaze, traces of consciousness emerge.

The square, a symbol of stability and an anchoring structure, engages in a dialogue with gold, that ancient symbol of permanence and the sacred. Between geology, contemplation, and erasure, the works advance like the vestiges of a shifting perception. They do not seek to reveal a truth, but to make visible what remains when the gaze accepts relinquishing control over what it sees, when the mind abdicates.