Downtown Suite is composed of fragments of Gardair’s past works on paper including fast-food packaging, BRIC’s printed visitor materials, and a sign from the recently shuttered Dollar Deal store that reads “Everything Must Go.” Although Gardair approaches the process of creation as a kind of game, his gathering of such abandoned and outdated elements points to a serious issue, the erasure of spaces amidst the rapid gentrification and redevelopment of Downtown Brooklyn. Unlike collage, whose materiality is dependant on the hiding or covering up of certain elements, Gardair’s use of inlay proposes a synergy among each material, migrating from one piece to the other, and existing as a whole. Perhaps the synergy found in this suite is offered as a step towards thinking of alliance-building as a means of memorializing the lived histories and experiences that form as a consequence of unencumbered gentrification.
Sasha So-Som Cordingley
French-born, Brooklyn-based artist Julien Gardair makes carpets, paper cutouts, paintings, sculptures, video, and everything in between. This proclivity for smooth sail between forms in context of specific sites globally paired with his insatiable explorations, make his body of work versatile, whimsical and layered.