Even those unfamiliar with French artist Laure Prouvost’s work may have heard the rumour that foreshadowed the 2019 Venice Biennale about the artist planning to dig a tunnel between the French and British pavilions – that is perhaps Prouvost in a nutshell: bold, funny and radical in an almost carefree and approachable manner.
Laure Prouvost: Oui Move In You is the latest instalment in the International series at ACCA (Australian Centre for Contemporary Art), featuring existing works – the oldest from 2013 – and new commissions in a maze of tactile discoveries.
Sometimes the exhibition didactics tell visitors how and where to look, but perhaps it is what is not mentioned in text that makes the in-person experience most vital for Oui Move In You.
Though Provoust’s sense of humour may appear childish at first, it is multilayered and prompts repeated looking. Objects and artefacts of glass and clay are scattered in an almost litter-like fashion across the two spaces holding Prouvost’s major installation pieces, Gathering Ho Ma, The glaneuse (2023), La forêt (2024) and Every Sunday, Grand Ma (2022).
They form visual riddles for visitors to decipher without any clear explanation. And they don’t need one, as the joy of discovery is valid in and of itself – that is the humour of Prouvost.
For example, a single ceramic shoe is on display next to a teacup that featured in the preceding video, Wantee (2013), prompting the tendency for art viewers to over-attribute metaphoric significance for its missing counterpart, only to be spotted again casually strewn next to some rocks as if washed up ashore near the exhibition’s exit.
Breasts also feature playfully, their presence gracing lamps, clocks, spiders and the lot.
For those with an art history pedigree, Prouvost’s works are laden with references to Dada, surrealism, Venus of Willendorf, Carolee Schneemann and Agnès Varda, but for others, they are equally whimsical, funny, authentic and absurd.
Further into the exhibition, the maternal stands at the centre of the video work, Four For See Beauties (2022), which seeks to recreate the experience of being inside a womb. Viewers are enclosed in a magnificent red viewing room after a briefly and purposefully disorientating pathway – it mimics how every one of us came into being with some level of confusion and startlement.
Calming clips of a breastfeeding infant are interwoven with three muses, sea life and soft sounds of the water. Here, Provoust resists the dominant lens of glorifying birth at the expense of the mother, making her stereotypical or anonymous; instead the artist lends equal proportion to her desires and psyche.
The show’s through line leans into the lived experiences of Prouvost’s grandmother, who also sustained an artistic practice in craft. This unabashed display of female authenticity runs throughout the show, connecting the video works in an interlinking web of desires, provocations, memories and speculative futures.
In this sense, Provoust’s colourful glass birds – with long, twisted necks and small, curious heads – become vessels that not only ground the presence of her works, but also harbour these provocations of storytelling, idealism and a lingering childlike naivety.
Furthermore, Provoust is a seamless facilitator and collaborator in integrating aspects of her practice with site-specific relevance. La forêt is built upon activities by students and teachers from across Victoria, who worked with ACCA and Provoust to create hanging mobiles made of discarded waste and organic matter such as feathers, twigs and flowers.
Read: Exhibition review: Leonardo da Vinci – 500 Years of Genius, THE LUME
Together, Oui Move In You encapsulates Prouvost’s practice in a succinct and endlessly delightful package, wrapped up with enough breadcrumbs to leave one wanting more.
Laure Prouvost: Oui Move In You is curated by Max Delany and Annika Kristensen, now on view at ACCA until 10 June; free.
