Paris Hynes & David Cyrenne
That Day but Mostly This Day, Tomorrow
Espace Maurice
November 24th - December 16th, 2023
“Those suitors prattled indoors and through the town.
“That day”, they said, but mostly “this day, Tomorrow”.
Ernest Sandeed, Standard Time, Ithaca,
Jago,
In dreams, I lift my head to face a jury. Thick wood table, thick wood non-carpeted floors. This dream: I have had three times in a week, and I am still unsure of what crime I stand accused of. The evidence, like fragments of a story: a setting, a time, an image of an aftermath, a few quotes -here and there, witnesses -here and there. This antenarrative is supposedly my own, but I have no memories of a time leading up to this present. This present is supposedly my own, but I have no anchors to tell you the year, the town, the weather. There is a certain Slant of light: Dickinson’s slant of light, not a Mediterranean one. And here, I wake up and I am no longer in the dream and I have done nothing terrible and I am reminded that I have to write to you.
About the image: it is dated from 1975, on a day that seemed warm and sunny (let's say mid-spring, sometime around May) pulled from the archives of Phyllis Lambert’s travels to Greece. It is labeled Iles Ioniennes (let's say Ithaca). I am told that in her archives there are multiple slides depicting wrought iron gates and burglar bars -midday sun, overshadowed flora, bright white stone, well guarded homes. You can tell the sky must have been clear and of that incomparable grecian blue. When Cyrenne first mentioned the photograph I pictured it a little different: perhaps more oppressive, definitely less romantic. In 75, Greece was just coming out of the Junta dictatorship. Political unrest was definitely palpable, but I imagine there must have been a sense of a new opening to the world, or that an impression of possibility was returned to its people.
David Cyrenne’s wall mounted pieces are bold. He has been pulling sketches from the collection of archival images for a few years now: the ways in which the gates hit glass, reflecting a horizon, the curvatures in the shadows. A large painting framed in aluminum, is punctuated with bright blue stained glass, casting discrete shading within its center. Most of Cyrenne’s materials are repurposed. A 100 year old glass and vintage wood, is harmoniously combined with abstract painting, felt and aluminum. If you were to tell me these had been made 50 years ago, I would believe you.
This nostalgia for a past we have not known, some call it an affliction. Others claim it is a depressive trait, to be constantly facing backwards from a moment instead of looking ahead. About Greece: it is impossible to think of the place and not think of ruins.
Paris Hynes’ wood sculptures are haunting - the way remains from any violent event would be, or clues to a dislocated antiquity, the traces of a people. Here, you might say it is possible to encounter figurative wood sculptures and think of futurity but I would reply that even in this futurity these objects would act as proof of a time passed. Hynes’ skillful carving and refined eye for design inform his sculptural choices. These works are imbued with a deep respect for the material and for the history of his medium.
What I am trying to get at is a mode of narrativization, that works backwards and simultaneously, suggesting a type of ambiguity that is malleable enough to play with, malleable enough to insert your own. I wish you could see: the artworks in the gallery are enchanting, and side by side they seem to function like poetic fragments, in which temporalities, psychogeography and archeology frame a personal affectation for minimalism, formalism and a slightly outsider folk art revival.
I have researched Greek archival images of cityscapes and architecture, sculptural fragments of legs from antiquity, I have pulled facts from 1975: in arts, in geo-politics, financial markets, but that isn't quite where the story lives.
I am so eager to read you, and encounter the fragments that form your personal archeology. To be led into your memories of Ithaca in spring, while standing in direct relation to these works, their materiality and the photograph.
Sincerely,
M. S. B.
DAVID CYRENNE (b.1994) is a multidisciplinary artist and curator born in Toronto and now based in Montreal, Canada. He holds a Bachelors in Fine Arts from Concordia University, with a focus on lithography and painting.
Inspired by the functional ornamentation of the 19th and 20th centuries, including stained glass windows, wrought iron gates, and woodwork, Cyrenne's work reflects an awareness of the diminishing presence of these crafts in our progressively digital society. Cyrenne’s hybrid approach to painting and sculpture, evokes a sense of the past and emphasizes the critical significance of preserving cultural heritage.
Cyrenne’s practice has progressively embraced a fusion of both new and reclaimed materials, such as steel, glass, and wood, exploring innovative, sculptural ways of approaching the surface, outside of the conventional boundaries of the frame.
Cyrenne is the curator of the book of photography Phyllis Lambert, Observation Is a Constant That Underlies All Approaches (2023, Lars Müller Publishers). Since 2016 he has worked in the vast personal photography archives of Phyllis Lambert at the Canadian Centre for Architecture. He is currently curating a selection for a photography exposition by digital art pioneer, Luc Courchesne. Cyrenne has exhibited his paintings and sculptures in Montreal and Toronto since 2012. He is an active member of the artist collective, “Passage Secret”
PARIS HYNES (b.1989) is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice spans from painting and sculpture, to furniture design. Born in Tucson, AZ, Paris currently lives in Brooklyn, NY.
By engaging in themes of surveillance, war, and the modern world of information anxiety, his work explores the psychological effects of history and the inherent strangeness of being. Hynes researches historical characters tied to government conspiracies, and dives into fictional stories that contain alternate realities, time travel, and spirituality, all of which manifest into his work.
The long artistic and utilitarian history tied to woodworking, informs Hyne’s most recent sculptural explorations. The organic material causes him to approach his research under a new lens as feelings of turmoil, ambivalence and affection reveal themselves in each carved piece.
Past exhibitions include a solo presentation, In the Shade of a Rubber Tree - Painting by Paris Hynes, Fourbarrel, San Francisco, CA (2014), and group shows, Freudian Slippers, Good Work Gallery, Brooklyn, NY (2015), U:L:O Part II 2016 | U: Al Bedell, Interstate Projects, Brooklyn, NY (2016), and Merde! Sculpture Auction and Gala for Alyssa Davis Gallery, 99 Scott, Brooklyn, NY (2022).
JAGO RACKHAM is a writer and cook based in London, his book To Entertain is coming out in April 2024. He publishes occasional writing on his Substack Greed and posts pictures of food on his Instagram @ectasy_cookbook
The gallery would like to thank Phyllis Lambert for loaning a photograph from her personal archives for this exhibition.
That Day but Mostly This Day, Tomorrow will be on view until December 16th, 2023. The gallery is open from Wednesday to Saturday from noon to 5 pm., as well as by appointment. Please get in touch if you would like to view the worklist or schedule a virtual walk through.
Maurice is located at 916 Ontario Est, apartment 320. Please call or text 438-409-3112 upon arrival if the door is locked.