His truncated pyramids, his deformations of the cube (called structural topology) and his works integrated into their environment have left the memory of Pierre Granche (1948-1997) as an erudite and sensitive artist. Should we still remember that.
As much as it was essential in the 1980s and 1990s — “a star », notes Laurent Vernet, director of the Center d’exposition de l’Université de Montréal (CEUM) — as much as he is practically forgotten. Not an award that honors his memory. Certainly, Pierre Granche died young (not even 50 years old) and his posthumous retrospective was held in 2002.
Twenty-one years later, the exhibition Granny/Workshop/Town, at the CEUM, is the result of a commitment by Laurent Vernet. “From my first day [comme directeur]on January 31, 2022, I announced that it was essential that we study Granche”, he said, as much during the opening of the exhibition as the next day, in an interview.
The artist and professor will always be linked to the University of Montreal. His courses, from 1974 to 1997, marked many future artists. One of his first public works, Topography/Topology (1980), survives, although altered, in front of the sports center of the establishment. Finally, the CEUM is the custodian of the Pierre Granche fund.
” The principles [d’intégration] that he put forward are fundamental in public art, indicates Laurent Vernet. [Il s’est battu pour] to have the artist recognized as a professional in planning and construction, and not as a [invité] at the end. »
Tinted with mathematics and poetry, his gaze targets “the great urban spectacle represented by the incessant construction of a city”, according to the artist Camille Rajotte, who has been active for 10 years. “Granche had the concern of a moving public, says the one who could be his spiritual daughter. His works offer several points of view, each as important as the other. »
“Even what we do not see is still present”, adds Laurent Vernet, about Topography/Topology, emblematic of structural topology. For Marie-Josèphe Vallée, Pierre Granche offered a unique experience of space, gallery or street. ” [Sans lui]we live in a sanitized world, on a smooth surface”, laments the design professor, invited to participate, with her students, in the scenography of the exhibition.
Urban sculptor
The study proposed by Granny/Workshop/Town brings together 17 works, from the first public commission — Tribute to workers (1973) — to the sculpture completed after his death — Thirty-two times will pass, the last will fly away (1998). Case studies, rather: the Granche fund, at the base of the exhibition, includes archives, drawings and models – few works. In any case, the sculptures, if they are not of the public art type, they form imposing installations.
“We had to make a choice between a work that takes up a quarter of the room and more projects. I chose abundance,” says Laurent Vernet, who also had to make a distinction with respect to the 2002 exhibition. [Celle-là] attempted to inscribe the artist in the history of art. Our point of view is to present it. It was the installation, us, the city. »
“Pierre Granche is an urban sculptor, uniquely,” said art historian Lise Lamarche of him in 1991. The city would be the main matrix of his sculpture. The man who called himself a “simple thinking worker” worked in and with the city, leaving about ten works in Montreal. His fine observation of a site was also expressed in London, Belgrade or even in Sorel-Tracy and Chicoutimi, two cases selected by Commissioner Vernet.
Landscape architect and professor at the University of Montreal, Nicole Valois worked with Granche to A model for nature (1988), at Cégep de Sorel-Tracy. She keeps the image of a “precursor”, for its respect of the territory. “He was working as an architect, visiting the site,” she says.
In Montérégie, industrial pollution had left its mark on Granche, and it was a “Noah’s ark to save trees” that he created in the courtyard of the Cégep. The installation includes real trees from the region and others in profile, made of steel. “Which one will die first, which one will survive… That was the idea. Today, the trees are mature, the same height as those made of steel, specifies the professor, relieved. A very beautiful garden. »
Not all works meet the same fate. Endless place (1980), produced at the Pulperie de Chicoutimi during a symposium, will however be restored. “The City of Saguenay is on its case,” says Laurent Vernet, who cannot express the same assurance about that located at the University of Montreal. Disturbingly, a text from the exhibition calls for “the conservation of this work [soit] considered”.
At the same time homage, dusting off and new lighting that this Granch/Workshop/City. Laurent Vernet sums up his expectations simply: “We hope that Ganche will be rediscovered. It is the objective. »