Paola Siri Renard (1993, France) lives and works in Paris and Brussels. Her sculptural work investigates art history, architecture and natural processes, like sloughing or fossilisation. From prevailing architectural forms, the artist isolates sculptural ornaments, which are then rescaled, segmented and reassembled into new compositions. Stripped from the original context, the elements gain an anachronistic dimension, carrying aesthetic codes from varying time periods. Renard’s visual language evokes metamorphosis, bodies disintegrating and morphing into new constellations. Her sculptures unveil and distort formal grids and political structures, subtly influencing spatial arrangements and dynamics of social interactions. Renard's work raises questions about the treatment of heritage, its dissemination, and the exclusionary underpinnings that marginalise specific identities.
Paola Siri Renard graduated in 2017 from the École des Beaux-Art in Paris, FR and studied in 2016 at Geidai University in Tokyo, JP. Following her graduation, she continued at the Kunstakademie in Düsseldorf, DE until 2021. Currently she is a HISK laureate in Brussels, BE. She was nominated for the 9ème Bourse Révélations Emerige 2022, Paris, FR and commissioned by Publiek Park 2023, Antwerp, BE. Installations and performances have been shown at De Appel, Amsterdam, NL; Pilar, Brussels, BE; Institut Français, Madrid, ES; Fondation Fiminco, Paris, FR; Galerie Jan van de Weyer, Düsseldorf, DE; Hôtel des Arts TPM, Toulon, FR; Kunstverein Mischpoke, Mönchengladbach, DE; DASH, Kortrijk, BE; Art Biesenthal, Berlin, DE; La Maréchalerie - CAC, Versailles, FR; amongst others.
Paola Siri Renard has been selected for the WIELS Residency Program in 2024 in Brussels, BE.
Paola Siri Renard’s sculptures are micro-architectures through which any individual can reclaim imperceptible architectural, cultural and normative realities via bodily experiments. Enlightened as much as distorted, they reveal formal grids and political structures which shape spaces and condition social interactions insidiously.
The transcription process isolates and rescales generic ornaments, bestowing upon them an autonomy that is stripped from any context. They acquire their own (dys)functionality. The anachronistic symbolism creates interfaces that undermine Western architectural orders. Paola Siri Renard reveals normative aesthetic codes spreading throughout centuries, in parallel with injunctions that neglect bodies ; echoing the history of her Martinican and Swedish roots.
Natural processes such as sloughing or fossilization interact with immutable ornamental layers, conferring upon them an aura of mutation. Emanating from this encounter, the metamorphic shapes of her test-instruments suggest imaginary displacement engines. Physical reappropriations of these besieging architectural growths question the treatment of designed heritage through the correlation between its circulation and the exclusion of specific identities.
