Mathieu houde, Feeding your own ideals will leave you starving, 2021
Laiton, bois d’oranger, bois de poirier, bouleau frisé, bois d’olivier, érable
Feeding your own ideals will leave you starving
In the past, people have God as their highest ideal. Nowadays, with the majority of people being atheist or agnostic, this highest ideal of the past have been replace by our own subjective ideals, either our ideals of being, ideals of morality, ideals of life, ideals of relationships… These new gods function as the same as God was in the past; we meditate our ideals, we long for them, we feed them, we work for them, we dream about them, we worship them, we even preach them… The only problem is that a vast majority of our little gods will deceive us when we will reach them in the future.
Wood spoons have been an essential tool for many centuries. People from all social class were using them. Kings were even often buried with their wood spoon. These meticulously carved and decorated wood spoons I have made were meant to make the observer think and meditate about their own ideals, these essentials gods that direct our life, and judge if really, they worth being fed and being fed with.
About
My work has its origins in the ancestral methodologies and techniques of sculpture, although over time modern processes, experimentation and the association of different materials have been grafted into it. The representation of the human being is the pillar of my practice. The subject of my artistic research being man, my works are influenced by everything that touches his nature and his environment, but more particularly theology, in which the latter occupies a central place.
The tormented and frenetic times in which we live constantly immerse us in new reflections on life. Through my interest in theology, I explore the different questions that the contemporary context brings and I try to see if some lines of thought might not be found in these ancient writings. In parallel to this subject, I also seek to deepen the notions of presence or “aura” that can be conferred to an object.
—Mathieu Houde
Mathieu Houde is a visual artist working in sculpture, who have participated to the International Sculpture Biennale of St-Jean-Port-Joli in 2018. Finalist of the Prix Émergence en métiers d’art of the Prix d’Excellence du Conseil de la culture in 2020, he is currently preparing his first solo exhibition at the Art-Image gallery in Gatineau for the year 2022.
Raised in a small village called Deschaillons-sur-Saint-Laurent, religious art was mainly the art form with which he had his first contacts and this greatly influenced his work, as did the surrounding nature of his hometown, since his work is playing with the themes of theology, philosophy and the concept of “aura”. It was in his early twenties that he began technical studies in sculpture at the Maison des Métiers d´arts in Quebec City, where he developed great technical skill as well as a genuine passion for three-dimensional art.
