Publication constituting a continuation of
Melody, the installation created by David Douard for Sculpture Garden, acquired by the city of Geneva, and which was subsequently
vandalized. This last point is at the heart of the book, which presents a graphic section bringing together reproductions of preparatory works for the piece, plates of images of the work in situ, and a discussion between the artist and the curator Devrim Bayar dealing with the status of this work during and after degradation.
Born 1983 in Perpignan, David Douard lives and works in Aubervilliers (France).
Language is the very basis of his work. The texts and poems he collects on the Internet are manipulated, transformed in order to become a vital flow, feeding into his sculptures. Through language as an ingredient, David Douard redefines space as hybrid and collective by injecting anonymous, chaotic, deviant, ill and frustrating poems in it. As he recreates an infected environment where the real world used to be, the fantasy brought by new digital technologies expands.
David Douard graduated from the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts de Paris in 2011. Since 2022, he teaches at the École nationale supérieure d'arts de Paris-Cergy. His work has been shown in solo and group exhibitions organized by international institutions such as UCCA Dune Art Museum, Qinhuangdao (2023); Serralves Museum, Porto (2022);
FRAC Île-de-France, Paris (2020); Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin (2019); KURA c/o Fonderia Artistica Battaglia, Milan (2018);
Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2014 and 2018); Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris, Paris (2017, 2015); Kunstverein Braunschweig, Braunschweig (2016); Fridericianum, Kassel (2015); Sculpture Center, New York (2014); Astrup Fearnley Museet, Oslo (2014); Fondation Pernod Ricard, Paris (2012). David Douard curated exhibitions at institutions such as the Fondation Pernod Ricard (2024) and Basement Roma (2024). He has also participated in various biennales: Belgrade Biennial (2021); Gwangju Biennial (2018); Taipei Biennial (2014);
Lyon Biennial (2013). In 2017-2018, he was a fellow-in-residence at the French Academy in Rome, Villa Medici. Additionally, he received the Fondazione Ettore Fico award in 2017 during the Artissima fair in Turin. His works are part of the collections of the Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami; Long Museum West Bund, Shanghai; Collection Pinault, Paris;
Serralves Museum, Porto; Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris, Paris; CNAP, Paris; Lafayette Anticipations, Paris; FRAC Île-de-France, Paris; FRAC Limousin, Limoges;
FRAC Champagne-Ardenne, Reims.
