The perception of depth is omnipresent. The vault becomes volatile, overflowing, dizzy; echo of an unfathomable sky. In the center, empty blocks are pressed against the retina, activating the construction of a fictitious space. These floating squares are reminiscent of the work of Peter Halley. The flat colour surface, alternately evoking the screen, an opening through the clouds or an access to a network of corridors and connections, is however opaque. In Pierre Julien, it is the surrounding masses that cause the impression of porosity and create a game of cognitive and visual opposition. Can we both stand in front of the gate and have crossed the threshold?

The injunction of the title requesting to leave any door as it was found relates to the code of propriety in rural areas, in which we can read a meditation on fluidity and movement linked to the civilizational imperatives of social organization, evolution and progress. It can also be understood as a warning. On the canvas, the richness of the whole pushes us to plunge, but it also generates a certain discomfort. Sometimes the pull - the unstoppable momentum - is threatening. Here, from the perspective taken, any alert is futile. It is too late to refuse a passage when it has already been started.

Text by Jonathan Bernier