Almost is a Game: Looking Glass Gallery presents the collages of Denis Theriault

The Looking Glass Gallery at St Johns Booksellers proudly presents the collages of Denis Theriault. His politically charged pieces will be up through the month of January. This will be Looking Glass's last exhibition at its current location. It has been a wonderful time sharing the work of all of our artists thoughout 2015, and 2016 will be an exciting time for the future of the gallery. We are sad to see Néna closing her doors. The bookstore has been such a boon to the community, and we are grateful to her for all the support she has given to the gallery and its artists. We will have an interview with Denis later in the month posted to this blog, and there is a reception and farewell party scheduled for the 15th of January. It has been a pleasure to work with Mr. Theriault, and we are very excited to be sharing this work with the St Johns community.

Artist statement for Denis Theriault

"almost is a game" Some of these weren't ever supposed to be seen in public. They were a thing I starting doing to feel more vital on Saturday nights when I'd otherwise be watching television. I hadn't done this collage for several years. I started up again after watching a movie about sad people that also made me sad. Collage always made sense to me, because I'm a writer and collage is so much like editing. I kept going. Some of them made me laugh and/or disturbed me. And then I started making pieces expressly so they could be seen in public. I pasted up bullets. I honored the lost scrawls on the backs of dust-binned heirlooms. I spread thick acrylic paints with my fingers and applied dirty words in clean vinyl. Some of them still made me laugh and/or disturbed me. Anyway, that's one way to describe why these exist. Another way is to remember something trite: Nothing is sacred. Because nothing is ever really ours, mine or yours. What you love will die. What you build will crumble. What you give today with so much meaning will be tossed aside some other day with remarkable ease. And the ugliest things we know will become beautiful just because they're gone and we know we can't have them again. Time and change are the most irreverent things we know. That feeling connects these pieces. And they give it face and form. This is why a grandmother might hold a corpse and think chipper thoughts. This is why a milk-fed boy might summon a dictator. This is why a young black murder victim's funeral program might wind up rescued from the muck at the Goodwill bins. The world shrugs as it rearranges itself. It doesn't care how we feel or what we wish we'd said or done.