PATRICK TRESSET | HUMAN STUDY #1
13.06.2018 - 23.06.2018
Opening in the presence of the artist on Wednesday, June 13, from 6 to 9 pm.
First invited to Rue Antoine gallery in 2014, Patrick Tresset presents Paul, a drawing robot made up of an eye and an arm.
Based in London, the artist is currently exhibiting at the Grand Palais as part of Artists & Robots, with an installation entitled Human Study #2, The Great Vanity with the Crow and the Fox. Inspired by 18th-century allegorical vanitas paintings, the work consists of three robots set to drawing a still life.
In dialogue with this exhibition, Rue Antoine gallery is hosting a similar installation from June 13 to 23, with one essential difference: the three robots, whose drawing styles have evolved over the years, will study and portray anyone who comes to sit for them.
Seated at wooden school desks and observing their model through a single eye, these robotic artists, reminiscent of Jean Tinguely’s fragile sculptures, will use their left arms to draw a portrait in Bic pen. During this session, which lasts around thirty minutes, the model must remain still and will only see their portrait once the drawing is complete.
At the end of each performance, the portraits will be displayed on the gallery walls before joining the Collection, which brings together portraits created by these robots since 2011.
Those wishing to take part in the performance as a model are strongly encouraged to book a session at: https://etude_humaine.youcanbook.me
Portraits will be drawn at Rue Antoine gallery from 11 am to 7 pm every day, except Monday, June 18.
Press
“Our quest? To free ourselves, as the sculptor Alberto Giacometti explained, from an emotional relationship with our subject, in order to find the truest expression of emotion.”
Le Monde, November 29, 2012
“Who, then, is the artist here? The robot? The computer programmer who developed the software? Or the visual artist?”
Télérama, April 12, 2018
“There is something special about the drawings made by Paul, Patrick Tresset’s drawing robot. Their ‘resemblance’ lies in their expressiveness, and their strength in their imperfection. In other words, they seem to be precisely everything a robot is not.”
L’Obs, November 14, 2014
“If we get robots to make art, they won’t bother to make war.”
Huffington Post, January 10, 2015
https://www.beauxarts.com/videos/artistes-robots-patrick-tresset/