Richard Purdy
Unrestored

Richard Purdy is a devilish being who takes crafty pleasure in turning certainties upside-down. For thirty years he has elaborated an œuvre steeped in the paradigm of inversion. With “Unrestored”, an installation curated in association with Richard Leydier, Purdy invites us to experience a gallery transformed into a device of reflections. On an unstable and dilapidated bridge, the viewer is invited to venture over dark waters occupying the floor space in a gallery of seemingly antique paintings. Landscapes, mythological scenes and portraits, all painted by the artist in a variety of styles to be “unrestored” (or artificially aged), are hung upside-down, provoking a vacillation of both the space and moment of contemplation.

Year of publication : july 2005
16×22 cm , 96 pages
Selling price : 23 €. Text in French and English.

Exhibition dates :
from July 1st to September 17, 2005.

Overture by Richard Purdy;
essay by Richard Leydier: “Wandering into Richard Purdy’s Maze”.

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