RESET

Make drifts on the forecourt

Talk about smoke bombs, brass bands and fireworks

vroom vroom the head in the wall

Make a recipe out of it

Be quiet by accumulation, like a drop of water overflowing from the vase.

And press reset to restart the game.

    “Lina Goudjil’s take shapes in the accumulation. A festive effervescence emerges continuously from her works and spreads a communicative joy of life. However, under cover of certain ingenuous, almost childish features, more complex figures rise up in the half-light. Her productions oscillate between a narrative of opulence and a narrative of focus. On one hand, there is the candidness of a festive and overflowing humanity; on the other, there is the rage and anger of a deaf and triumphant activism. Often in her work, it is difficult to distinguish a precise intention at first glance, it’s because you have to look at the piece as a whole, you have to wallow into it like you would wallow in the party.

    Pictures are the doyennes of space. Like a grandmother telling you about her youthful adventures while stirring a gravy dish simmering in the kitchen, they are the ones who tell the myriad of stories that scroll on the plasterboards clinging to the wall. They seem to come from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. From the street, from home, from days and nights, from Google and YouTube, from the depths of the Internet, from the Instagram feeds of strangers, from those of Lina and of her friends, from protests and rallies… Everything fits in chaos and without hierarchy both in her phone and on the grey face of the plasterboard installed in the gallery. It’s a real parade. The images flow in and replay the time-consuming movement of an incessant scroll. In the notes on her phone, she has kept pieces of adventures that are both intimate and collective. In her photo album, there are several kilobytes of half-blurred videos and crooked shots. Taken out of context, they are preserving its effervescence. They tell everything that remains of the candor of these unspeakable moments. […]

    Lina’s sculptures stand alongside this overwhelming energy. The forms are also twisted, feeding their plaster outgrowths. They are colored with a set of grigris, tubes of chichas, scratchy Cash games, belly dance belts, pieces of ruffles, pearl necklaces, acid smileys and fairy wings worn at a free party in the belly of a dodgy bridge that has been shaking under the basses all night. They are dressed in their loudest outfits, the ones you only put on to say you are not ready to go to bed. Bring out your fluorescent spats, your smoke bombs and your fireworks and come spiting confetti until the ground disappears in the general mayhem…”