REVIEWS
CAPTEURS
At the crossroads of modern architectural ornament, industrial design and sculpture, Cécile Daladier’s Capteurs can also
be defined as modules whose gathering and combination rules are closely determined by the host location. The
geometrical figures of Capteurs are dominated by a straight line and a right angle: squares or rectangles recalling the
frame of images—that of a tableau in a cinematographic frame—but it also echoes the doorframe and the windows, the
silhouette of buildings and the outline of furniture as banal and quotidian as a bed, a carpet, a pedestal, a chair or a
table.
To the minimalist severity of the material and rigid frame of Capteurs contrasts the fleeting and ephemeral shimmer of
the effects of light revealed by reflecting glass and liquid surfaces, but also the playful games of glimpses or
transparencies that it implements. These are modular objects that, by their presence in given places, tend to erase the
boundaries between immobility and movement, unity and series, stagnation and fluidity.
Taking an essential pattern of the traditions of ornamentation in architecture, Capteurs hold a special relationship with
the vegetal world. As the acanthus carved in the marquees of classical architecture and floral scrolls to which the
designers of Art Nouveau refer, Capteurs appear as entities able not to imitate but to host the botanical world and
diffuse it in the architecture according to multiple modalities.
Emile Soulier, Writer, Paris, 2007
(originally written in French)
A RENEWED ACUITY OF OUR SENSES IN A NATURAL ENVIRONMENT
The exploration of light and perceptual phenomena has fascinated a certain number of artists working outdoors who are turned towards landscape and nature in situ. Cécile Daladier's « capteurs » are samples of a practice which, in France, is not so much attached to the production of objects or to the creation of artist's gardens as to the staging of landscape situations which allow a renewed acuity of our senses in a
natural environment. (...) Art, by multiplying the ways of access to nature, gives us back an image that is both much more familiar, even more intimate, and otherwise shared.
Gilles A. Tiberghien, Philosophe, Université de Paris I Panthéon—Sorbonne. In: Créateurs de jardins et de paysages en France; Ed. Actes Sud, Paris, May 2002,
(originally written in French)
ALLOWING THE DYNAMIC QUALITIES OF NATURE TO BE VISIBLE
The artistic practice of Cécile Daladier focuses on the ephemerality of nature. By allowing the dynamic qualities of nature to be visible, art may contribute significantly to the understanding and appreciation of ecological processes.
In a very simple and direct way the Capteurs redirect viewer’s attention towards natural processes and provide participants with experiences centered on seeing temporal qualities of nature. In her paintings also, Daladier's interest in nature is centered on the fact that nature changes and develops on its own —through cycles of life and death. For example when she places canvases under chestnut trees to collect organic matter allowed to decompose and make imprints as do insects and other animals who make tracks and marks that are also recorded. Or when her still life paintings are made from freely sprouting and decomposing vegetables or fruits such as potatoes and lemons embedded in beeswax.
Lauri Macmillan Johnson - Professor - School of Landscape Architecture - The University of Arizona. In: "Art and the New Ecological Landscape Aesthetic: Three Cases" Tucson 2006
FIRST PRIZE: A GARDEN DOMAIN IN MINIATURE BY CÉCILE DALADIER ET NICOLAS SOULIER. (INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION "BEST PRIVATE PLOTS – DIE BESTEN GÄRTEN" AUSTRIA - 2006)
"The plot for this garden in Paris's fourteenth arrondissement, shaded by six- and seven-storey structures, comprises only twenty square metres. An artist and an architect transformed this garden – previously an eyesore – in front of their flat into a small garden realm in which they can observe natural processes.
Three raised beds edged with steel form the spatial framework. Two steel-frame benches with removable chestnut planks link the beds of roses and climbing roses, box-tree, cranesbills, hortensias, wild strawberries, baby's tears, hellebore, bear's breeches, bracken and bellflowers.
The special elements which were introduced include small water tables, so-called capteurs, as well as window and mirror gardens. The capteurs, made in varying sizes of bronze or rusted steel and supported by slender legs, are distributed within the garden and are intended to assist in heightening the perception of rain, wind, light and sky. When the rainwater evaporates, the owners refill the capteurs. The mirror-garden consists of zinc planters, attached to the house walls; they bring more light into the shady courtyard and open up new sight-lines. The window-gardens, also made of zinc, can be hung from a sill, placed on the ground, or integrated in the bench's steel frame."
"The award honors exceptional achievements in the design of sustainable private outdoor spaces and gardens. The competition highlights gardens as a contemporary dialogue between architecture, ecology and landscape"
OFFERING ITSELF TO THE SENSES, LIKE A GARDEN
Cécile Daladier and Nicolas Soulier are interested in the relationship between a work of art and its environment, whether natural or architectural. They develop a plastic vocabulary that frequently includes water, light, its reflection, plants and receptacles.
For the Cascade, they intervened on a large part of the first floor spaces accessible to the public and deployed a set of forty nine mirror gardens, mainly installed in the cloister, as well as a collection of old roses, on the entrance and outside courtyard.
Conceived as a sculpture deployed in space, the work stretches along an entire pathway that we can leave, but to which our footsteps bring us back again and again. Entitled Fil Rouge (Red Thread), the work is like a garden, welcoming visitors, accompanying them and awakening their senses, all the while echoing the magic of the show. The red color of the roses and mirror gardens evokes the world of theater. The mirror-gardens reflect a particular image that is slightly tinted and seems to vibrate when our gaze moves, a little like the surface of water. We are then already immersed in a staged, transfigured reality: that of the show.
The artists also paid particular attention to the history of the building and its new destiny. The building, which has been home to many generations of students, is part of the collective memory of Bourg-Saint-Andéol; the old roses that greet visitors, as in old houses, evoke memories, like the memory of a perfume. To this place of work, life and spectacle, open to the public and to the city, the work also responds generously by offering itself to the senses, like a garden.
Maison des Arts du Cirque et du Clown, Bourg St Andeol , Ardèche, France 2008 , text for the public (originally written in French
)
THE CERAMIC WORK OF CÉCILE FUNCTIONS AS A LENS
French artist Cécile Daladier creates vessels and vases that bring the natural world inside our homes. She has the ability to evoke a whole landscape with such a seemingly simple thing as a clay vase, containing one single flower. The strong bold shapes of the vessels contrast with the fragile delicacy of the flowers
they hold. Her objects are fashioned from clay and smoked, using dry grasses and fallen leaves gathered around her studio in La Drôme. Each flower is treated with care and respect, and can be placed in individual openings. Together the flowers create an unexpected bouquet.The water inside the vases is often visible, reflecting the flowers and the light. The ceramic work of Cécile functions as a lens, showcasing the botanical wonders they hold, creating a small homage to the natural world. Through her vases and vessels, Cécile brings a reverence for nature inside our houses.
Joost Emmerik - garden and landscape architect, Rotterdam, 2023
Head of the Master’s programme in Landscape Architecture at the Amsterdam Academy of Architecture
THE ART FORM AS A REVELATORY INSTRUMENT
Over the past thirty years, Cecile Daladier used various mediums and for more than ten years now
ceramics, encapsulating a central purpose: the art form as a revelatory instrument.
By paying close attention to the expression of what grows, lives, dies or passes through us and
reinvigorating the neglected aspects of nature and daily life, Cécile’s purpose is to create works that enable
us to rediscover certain facets of things, beings, landscapes that surround us.
Flow Gallery, London, Yvonna Demczynska , 2023