Nymphenbrünnen

Nymphenbrünnen Adèle Vivet draws inspiration from the ornamentation of Christian sacred architecture — capitals, tympanums, keystones, bas-reliefs — to create hybrid forms through ceramics and 3D printing. Nymphenbrünnen imagines a carnal encounter between her sculptures and the Gothic architecture of the Saint-Ouen abbey church in Rouen, a place deeply cherished from her childhood. The exhibition creates a singular space for formal dialogue between the seemingly pious monumentality of the building and the artist’s sensual, voracious mythology, which unfolds before us. Through the extraction of various monstrous figures from architectural vocabulary — gargoyles, caryatids, sirens, Medusas, and others — Adèle Vivet proposes a reinterpretation through the lens of her own body, establishing an ambiguous relationship that is at once hyper-sensual and self-punitive. Within this personal storytelling, she surrounds herself with a clique of legendary wicked women whose desires are emancipated and unapologetic. Yet her inner monsters appear entirely exposed and far less assured, shaped by visceral concerns: the playfulness of their attitudes expresses a voracity that continually swells with the desire for transgression, followed by the mental flagellation and guilt that pleasure itself seems to generate here. The Chimerea series, composed of five totemic sculptures, formally combines the technical concept of the caryatid with that of the bas-relief in order to stack micro-narratives upon one another. These hydro-chimeras function as confessional portraits, staging the nuanced facets and shadowy dimensions of a young woman trapped between desire and guilt, profound disappointments and ecstatic joys. Oscillating between the technological precision of 3D printing and the human tactility of ceramics, these Boschian nymphets seem to have boarded the Goa’uld spacecraft of an erotic-parodic spin-off, joyfully evoking the playful aesthetics of hentai pornography and erotic comics. At the heart of this procession of fountain-women persists an obsession: that of the failing fleshly envelope caught in paradox — a body devoured by Judeo-Christian shame, constrained by social and moral injunctions, yet seized by an insatiable and polysemic appetite. Adèle Vivet’s work gives form to this intimate abyss: her sculptures beautifully exude ugliness, excess, and bodily fluids, through details evoking vomit, vaginal secretions, tears, saliva, and semen. Each figure appears both to revel in and suffer from its own materiality, while confessing — with universally addressed tenderness — the impulses, fractures, and desires that have long been suppressed or erased. Collaboration with DJ and composer LAZE: an immersive sound piece conceived by invited musician Laze amplifies this troubling and visceral atmosphere, enveloping the space in an organic sonic landscape and materializing the threshold between two eras that Adèle Vivet seeks to open.