Galerie Georges-Philippe et Nathalie Vallois, Paris

Based on a simple gesture, the artist’s minimum gesture: stacking existing forms, Julien Berthier offers an obvious, modest and almost anonymous sculptural form: a stack of pebbles in the shape of a 1:1 seat, made of resin. The round rock is projected onto the wall like an orange rectangle at the end of the day, an abstract setting sun. The rock is rotated by around 20 degrees to move around the wall. The viewer is invited to sit or lie down facing the landscape, or rather facing the image of the landscape. There might be a hidden drawer with alcohol or micro-dosed recreational drugs. This look at the artificiality of the very concept of landscape, this taste for the question of decorum and its reverse, are very dear to the artist. They are at the heart of this sculpture/furniture, which is reminiscent of the old Italian design of the 1960s: kitsch and cool, absurd and a little magical. This installation is accompanied by a model for a future public sculpture project entitled “The Last Ray”. These are small buildings and this end-of-day ray lights up on one of the gable walls of one of the buildings at set time or with a remote control.