Name: TVO Arts - BGL, Canadassimo (Dépanneur)
Uploaded: 2022-01-27
Duration: 10 min 20 s
Description: Art collective BGL magically transports spectators with a playful installation that recreates the experience of a Quebecois dépanneur, or corner store.

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What do you think about art like <em>Dépanneur</em> that is made from ordinary and familiar objects?

Art collective BGL magically transports spectators with a playful installation that recreates the experience of a Quebecois dépanneur, or corner store.

TVO Arts - BGL, Canadassimo (Dépanneur)

00:01
[Music]
00:03
we've all seen art that imitates a
00:05
person or a place
00:06
but can art recreate an experience
00:10
this is canada
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it was made by the quebec city art
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collective beijel in 2015.
00:20
that year the group was selected to
00:21
represent canada at the veris biennale
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it's kind of like the olympics of
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contemporary art
00:29
there BGL totally transformed the
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canadian pavilion
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visitors had to enter through this
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ordinary looking corner store
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but what they found inside was puzzling
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playful and anything but ordinary
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i see familiarity
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this is right on the corner of my street
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very literally
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brands i grew up with and even adverts
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like exactly what you would expect when
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you go in to that kind of corner store
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super up north canada the products that
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you find like the hickory sticks
01:00
barbecue chips it's very canadian like
01:03
it feels very commonplace so
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it's not something you would immediately
01:08
think of as being shown in like one of
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the world's greatest art shows
01:13
past the sandwich board and through the
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door that jingles as you enter you'll
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find an oddly familiar scene shelves
01:20
heaving with snack foods household
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cleaners and canned goods racks
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cluttered with magazines a fridge loaded
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with soft drinks and beer
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ads tempting you to try the weekly lotto
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and a cash register ready to ring up
01:35
your purchases
01:37
inside the canadian pavilion beijiel
01:40
constructed a full-scale convenience
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store it's what quebecers call a
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depanure or sometimes just the depp
01:48
and BGL's depth stocks hundreds and
01:51
hundreds of products
01:53
some known globally some mainly popular
01:55
in canada and some specific to quebec
01:58
the level of detail is incredible do you
02:01
notice the patterned vinyl floor
02:03
the security mirror the water damaged
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ceiling or the owner's handmade signs
02:09
the store looks a bit shabby
02:12
BGL call it cozy and low budget
02:16
it's meant to resemble an independent
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family-owned business rather than a
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slick corporate chain but a highly
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realistic reproduction is the only thing
02:25
the playful trio had in store for
02:27
visitors
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as you move toward the back of the shop
02:30
you'll notice something strange happens
02:33
the designs on the packages become
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blurry and difficult to read
02:37
they look almost out of focus
02:40
we wanted to generate a surprise
02:42
we're hoping to surprise the public it
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almost looks like it's a movie set or a
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tv set where they're filming something
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except the difference between this and a
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movie set is you can see all the brands
02:54
there's something
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a little bit jarring about that i guess
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the thing that jumps out at me is just
03:00
i'm a little confused by it
03:03
so who's responsible for building this
03:05
most perplexing scene
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BGL was an art collective that began
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in 1996 at laval university and was
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active until 2021
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the moniker comes from their surnames
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jasmine biledo sebastian jiger and
03:23
nicholas levaldiere
03:26
the trio follows in the great tradition
03:28
of canadian artist collectives which
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includes groups like general idea
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fast worms
03:34
and asuma
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working together the three artists found
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a whimsical prankster-ish energy
03:42
they also discovered they were more
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effective as a team
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we had more fun and i would even think
03:48
it was easier to produce great two
03:51
friends than by myself a lot easier and
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a lot funnier
03:57
the group worked primarily in
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performance and installation
04:02
installation art describes large-scale
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constructions made from a mixture of
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materials often designed for a specific
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place or time
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the collective is known for their
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giant-sized immersive installations that
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play with the experience of the
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spectator
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no one would ever call BGL's work
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stuffy or inaccessible
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their art is funny spectacular even yet
04:30
it addresses serious issues
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like consumerism
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and the environment
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[Music]
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recycling and repurposing were always
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key to the way they made
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art the group once said recycling
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enables us to find things that already
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show where
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that have patina a color
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a smell
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a poetry
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in some instances like de panner they
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used recognizable manufactured objects
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as their building blocks
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it's similar to the way marcel deschamps
05:01
took a real porcelain urinal and
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presented it as sculpture
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or how andy warhol obsessed over the
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packaging of soup cans and scouring pads
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ideas that challenged what art even is
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only here the everyday objects have been
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multiplied by the hundreds
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i think it's a wonderful idea i mean
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it's like finding beauty in things that
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are maybe not traditionally beautiful
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it's so hard to purposely make something
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look like an original thing that someone
05:33
would just make by themselves i would
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say it's so realistic to the point that
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it's almost too realistic once you take
05:39
it out of the gallery i don't know if it
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has the same value when BGL first
05:43
visited the giardini in venice where the
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biennale was held they thought the
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canadian pavilion looked like a service
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station
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that's where the idea to make a shop
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came from
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the trio purchased displays shelving and
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an old fridge from a depth near their
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studio that had recently gone out of
06:00
business
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their stores scruffy wooden walls thick
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with paint came from an old country
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house that was set to be demolished
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they chose these items because they
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showed age and use
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the snack foods and household products
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were bought new but many of the cans and
06:20
packages needed to be emptied stuffed
06:22
and resealed before shipping
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BGL also manipulated some of the
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product labels by scanning the packages
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modifying their image then printing and
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reapplying the labels
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to make the experience feel even more
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real bezierelle piped the noises of an
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old refrigerator and fluorescent
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lighting into the installation space
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all of ganedecimal filled three 40-foot
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shipping containers
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the whole store was assembled first in
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quebec city then taken apart and shipped
06:56
to venice in segments
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beijiel surprises the visitor who finds
07:01
themselves not in a typical gallery
07:03
environment
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but zapped into the isles of a dependent
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visitors in venice were transported to
07:10
the average street corner in quebec
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although there are convenience stores
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all around the world the depanel's
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particular mix of languages products and
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symbols creates a very specific
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experience of place
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representing canada in venice it also
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recognizes the role of french canadian
07:29
culture within our national identity
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for many it will be familiar but also
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unfamiliar
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depending on where you're from the
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languages might be foreign the snacks
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different and the brands unrecognizable
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but for some it will be an experience of
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home
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if you're a baker or canadian and you
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have been a defender for sure when you
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pass the door the smell the sound and
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all the object there you like came back
08:02
back home like very fast and then oh wow
08:05
it's rare in contemporary raw art
08:09
what then should we make of all those
08:11
blurry packages
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BGL calls the effect cinematic
08:16
but when asked why they did it
08:18
the group doesn't give a straight answer
08:21
they themselves are blurry about the
08:23
reason
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textbook BGL trickery
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it's almost as if the near perfect
08:29
simulation of the dip has begun to
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glitch
08:33
it causes you to question the experience
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they make you think twice about the
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everyday world that's around you
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like so much of BGL's work depending
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is funny the artists want you to laugh
08:47
at their art
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BGL says there's so much content
08:51
clamoring for our attention
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humor is one way to get people to take
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notice
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when you have that kind of emotion of
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all smiling or you have another souvenir
09:03
of this experience i guess and this
09:07
is a bit important because our life just
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the collection of souvenirs
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the experience was so unusual so
09:16
striking that visitors asked if they
09:18
could buy a souvenir from the depanure
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the maple syrup especially
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but in giving visitors a smile a memory
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and creating a vivid experience
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BGL sends everyone home with a
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souvenir you can't just buy in any store
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join us as we decode canadian art and
09:37
understand why looking at art
09:40
matters
09:41
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09:53
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10:10
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Can art recreate an experience? See what the Quebec City art collective BGL has in store for spectators with Canadassimo (Dépanneur) at TVO Arts.

BLG – Canadassimo (Dépanneur)