CHAPTER 1: Glyphs, grids, letters, words, and writing

This chapter brings together works in which writing, reduced to signs, is expressed without images, emphasizing the plasticity of the text. It is therefore writing that is freed from any legibility. Jeannot’s Plancher and the works presented here are at the crossroads of two approaches: on the one hand, writing without codification, which does not claim to be directly comprehensible; on the other hand, radical writing, asserted as the sole visual object constituting the work.

Artists : Roland Barthes, Christian Dotremont, Ian Hamilton Finlay, Sol LeWitt, Agnes Martin, Henri Michaux, Gabriel Orozco, Pablo Picasso, Antoni Tàpies.      ___________________________

CHAPTER 2 : “La lettre volée”

Secretly engraved in 1972, Le Plancher de Jeannot remained unknown until its discovery in 1994, when it was exhibited, making it visible to all. Borrowed from Edgar Allan Poe’s short story, “La lettre volée” refers to a letter that everyone believes to be hidden, when in fact it has been deliberately left in plain sight. Each work in this chapter embodies this purloined letter: what is written remains inaccessible to the reader, due to the desire of their creators to transform them.

Artists : Pierre Buraglio, Erik Dietman, Gérard Duchêne, François Dufrène, Paul-Armand Gette, Jean-Luc Parant, Tom Phillips, Wolf Vostell.

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CHAPTER 3 : Implementation of the substrate

The implementation of the substrate refers to the material and surface on which the work takes shape. The text of Le Plancher de Jeannot was engraved by its author into the floor of his bedroom. Subjected to words, the oak floor was not simply a medium that became a work of art. The works brought together here bear witness to this transformation of the medium, where the material aspect becomes essential to the constitution of the work.

Artists : Ghada Amer, Antonin Artaud, Bernard Aubertin, Cathryn Boch, Brassaï, Günter Brus, Pierre Buraglio, Dominique De Beir, Daniel Dezeuze, Lucio Fontana, Pierre Mercier, Arnulf Rainer, François Rouan, Niki de Saint Phalle, Günther Uecker.

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CHAPTER 4 : The House

Jean Crampilh-Broucaret engraved the floor shortly after the death of his mother, who was buried under the stairs of the family home. This gesture transformed the house into a unique place with a new identity: a tomb-house. The works presented here do not reside in writing, but in the immaterial and symbolic process linked to the house: the memory of places, of nest-houses, of mother-houses, even of destroyed houses.

Artists : Thierry De Cordier, Mario Del Curto, Etienne-Martin, Jochen Gerz, Richard Greaves, Gordon Matta-Clark, Lawrence Weiner.