MURMURE "JUSQU'ICI TOUT VA BIEN"

Galerie LJ presents “Jusqu'ici tout va bien” (So Far, So Good), the second solo exhibition with the gallery of French artist duo Murmure, from October 15 to November 26, 2022. Paul Ressencourt (born in 1981) and Simon Roché (born in 1983) met during their studies at the Fine Arts School of Caen: they quickly found a common passion for drawing and street art. Working together since 2010 in the public space, they cover city walls with collages as much as they develop a studio practice nourished by their academic training.
Following up their ongoing work on environmentally conscious themes, they report through several new series of artworks presented in this second exhibition at the gallery, the absurd paradox of certain current situations where reality regularly exceeds fiction. By bringing together a set of observations put into images in the form of drawings in charcoal pencil, and paintings on canvas, Murmure highlights facts in total contradiction with the emergency of climate change.
While we watch helplessly as our planet is destroyed, burned, melted… is there really nothing we can do? Instead of initiating real major changes in its way of life and consumption, humanity seems to remain blind, even if it means witnessing scenes that were previously unthinkable: “So far so good”… but until when? And is everything really still okay? On the ice field transformed into an open-air construction site, the icebergs become aquatic parks with turquoise waters overcrowded with tourists, where the fauna no longer has its place. In this pessimistic anticipation of our near future, whales end up as sushi, Molotov cocktails are made in bottles of organic drinks from “fair” trade, the municipal cleaner erases the street art of the artist whose T-shirt he wears, the street artist claims to be anti-capitalist even though he has made a fortune in the trade of clothes which carbon footprint is as questionable as the fruits of mass consumption.
In spite of everything, Murmure favors in their art a form of beauty which contrasts with the cruelty, the stupidity and the urgency of the situations depicted in their works. Isn’t the essence of art to be the witness of an era? Thus the art of Murmure reveals a cry of alarm, hoping that it is not too late for humanity to pull itself together.