Yolande Fièvre
The oneiroscope
It's nice to follow the movements of the clouds in all directions: those that rise, those that descend, and there are even some that seem to be spinning on the spot. It happens that in the same place in the sky some rise and others descend: they flee to the right as well as to the left. It's also nice to watch a rough sea. Or soap bubbles that fly away as soon as they are inflated, from any side. For no apparent reason. Or rather for so many reasons and winds that we quickly give up looking for them. Besides, the winds are not visible.
It's nice, because so much inexplicable agitation makes us feel that our ordinary worries are a little frivolous, and so are our thoughts, and of course our beliefs; it is a great void that arises within us. And why do they give it to us? Did we have so many worries? We don't know anything about it. Why are we happy to find ourselves frivolous? Were we too serious? Did we dream of passing through life without leaving the slightest trace? We are like that.
With a little sand, two or three threads, a wallpaper star, strong cardboard and sticky paper, Yolande Fièvre makes curious toys, which make us think of peaks, polar shores, black and white expanses over which a hot air balloon flies. But no sooner have you taken the toy in hand than the shore melts into ashes and the hot air balloon turns into a spider, under a cascade of fog; the peak becomes reindeer, swan, wave, frigate or bubble.
Because the sand is both the sea and the clouds: changing like them, and like them pleasing to the eye. The wind, as soon as it is brisk, agitates it and carries it away. However, it defends itself better than waves or clouds: it is more awkward and heavier. It is also that it is held back in its movements by all sorts of invisible roots and rootlets, and the sands of Fever also advance in fits and starts, so that it mixes with the frivolity of some unknown feeling of courage or resistance.
It's a game that we happily spend hours on, and I sincerely recommend it to anyone who has neither waves nor clouds at hand.
I mentioned a toy. It is because we must give things their most modest name.
Jean Paulhan, 1957.
Resources
Works by Yolande Fièvre (Nathalie Seroussi site)
Exhibitions :