Gisele Amantea: Sweet Dreams, Hard Truths - Eve-lyne Beaudry, Rebecca Duclos, D

Publication date: May 1, 2014

Gisele Amantea. Sweet Dreams, Hard Truths is a monograph devoted to the work of artist Gisele Amantea. The publication was produced following an exhibition of the same title held at the Musée d'art de Joliette in the winter of 2010. In addition to a significant selection of works produced between 1987 and 2012, the book includes a text by Eve-Lyne Beaudry, curator of the exhibition, by Rebecca Duclos, art historian, as well as an exchange between the artist and Denise Markonish, curator of the exhibition Oh, Canada presented at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art in 2012-2013 and which included Amantea's work Democracy . Through their writings, the authors address the evolution of the artist's career and take a critical look at her work and the changes in artistic concerns that have marked her practice.

Amantea’s works have always been concerned with social and identity concerns, while being imbued with cultural, historical and political references. These references weave through her works with a voluptuous elegance that testifies to the artist’s skill in handling different strategies of appropriation. Amantea’s approach is characterized by borrowing motifs and objects from popular culture – cheap figurines, interior decorations, images from films or television shows – and symbols that are generally associated with oppression – walls, barricades, barbed wire. These samples, which often represent the result of rigorous research, are then transposed into sculptures, installations or wall works that the artist strives to give a somewhat flashy kitsch appearance.

Co-published by the Musée d’art de Joliette and the artist

110 pages, color illustrations

26 x 21 cm, hard cover

In French and English