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Photos and fisticuffs Outremer hits the streets by KEITH MARCHAND
Keith Marchand: Who are you guys, anyway? Gary Comeau: We're two 26-year-old hoodlums. I'm a poet and he's a video artist and we've been training hard to take on an art world that can be set in its ways. KM: What the hell are you guys thinking? GC: The idea behind Outremer is to create an itinerant gallery that can accommodate an artist's vision, rather than restrict it. KM: So what's the plan? GC: We want to take on a limited number of artists and work with them on a project-by-project basis. We want to collaborate with other art dealers not limited by a permanent address--like Kenny Schacter of New York and Jay Jopling of the White Cube Gallery in London who represents Damien Hirst, Gary Hume and Fiona Rae... They're the leaders of the new so-called British brat-pack. They are attracting huge numbers of people not usually interested in contemporary art. Contemporary art can be fun and part of a gallery's mandate should be to promote an understanding of it to a wide range of people, rather than to preach to the converted. KM: What kind of art do you want to promote? GC: We are open to all new art. We welcome proposals. KM: Where are you planning to exhibit next? GC: Wherever the artist we're interested in wants. We don't want to be booked two years in advance, like most galleries. We want to surprise and to stay fresh. For their inaugural exhibition, Outremer will be showing works by Leo Frontin, a photographer of Rumanian origin, living in the Gaspé. The artist himself sums up the show in one sentence: "We will find the traces of a civilization in these lands where the photographic tool has lived." Leo Frontin's works are showing at 1435 Bleury, suite 1015, until March 31 |
During my 58-year career as an adventure writer, I have experienced many exciting moments: white water rafting with Leo Castelli, motorcycle racing with Robert Motherwell and Sigmar Polke and I taking on André the Giant and Rowdy Roddy Piper in a tag-team wrestling match. This week, I step into the ring to go a few rounds with a couple of hardened (and only slightly punch-drunk) artists, Gary Comeau and Martin Ravary--killers in their own right and founders of itinerant gallery Outremer. The following interview resulted in considerable physical trauma sustained by all parties involved: