Escale 1964

Curator: Herve Telemaque's 1964 work, "Escale", brings together painting and assemblage to make quite the statement. Editor: It feels like organized chaos! The flat planes of bright acrylic, mixed with recognizable brand imagery and cartoon figures, make it feel chaotic, almost like Pop Art meets a child's collage. Curator: Indeed. Considering it was created in the mid-sixties, it's very plugged into the burgeoning consumer culture. The ESSO logo, the cartoon caricatures…Telemaque is using these found elements to comment on mass production and its impact. He blurs lines between commercial graphics, painting, and everyday life, and the process reveals so much. Editor: So it is not pure spontaneity? I see the point regarding process! But I wonder about this chaos… Is he embracing Pop Art's enthusiasm for the democratization of imagery, or critiquing it? Curator: Perhaps both. This piece has that subversive edge we often see in post-war art. Think about where this was exhibited; Telemaque and other artists showing similar artworks challenged accepted exhibition and collecting standards by deliberately subverting and remixing familiar themes, icons, materials, and processes. Editor: Right, so even the choice of materials… using acrylic, which was relatively new at the time, places this piece at a crossroads of art history. Were high and low art beginning to speak to each other differently, even directly criticizing each other. Curator: Absolutely. By incorporating objects found readily around us into painted sections on the flat plane of his work, Telemaque is levelling any hierarchical difference between them. We can contemplate the relationship between the sail of a ship and the cartoon’s absurd grimace, and our interpretations and understandings become intertwined, inseparable, fused like the collage itself. Editor: I came in seeing vibrant clutter, but seeing its themes through the lens of cultural history, especially the institutions showing these pieces, has really shifted how I read it. It speaks to something deeper, beyond the initial impression of playful consumerism. Curator: Exactly, seeing the piece beyond its literal presentation really makes one aware of the materials selected, processes employed, and all other contexts impacting its creation. Therein lies the heart of Telemaque’s statement with "Escale".