BEAUFILS, Julie
Le Large
Wow, we made it ! This light, pocketbook format new publication by After 8 Books gathers works by French artist Julie Beaufils, and three short stories commissioned for the occasion, dealing altogether with social tensions and emotional explosions.
The ink drawings by Julie Beaufils that form the core of the book, follow a logic of editing, accumulation and narrative incompleteness: the figures come from memories of films or TV series, as sediments of mass culture, or sometimes from personal observations and experiences crystallized in images. Shapes and figures develop as an ambivalent collection, informed by the weight and the vibration of lines and strokes.
This book aims at triggering the interpretation of these works, and at making their “reading” more complex, more playful too. Graphic designer Scott Ponik composed a visual story close to a manga, part abstraction, part emotion. The narrative and affective potential of the drawings is further activated by their free association with three short stories by Michael Van den Abeele, Buck Ellison, and Reba Maybury. Van den Abeele tells about the inner thoughts of a donor at the sperm bank; Buck Ellison’s story follows a few hours in the life of some girls in the San Francisco area, dealing with the cruelty and the naïvety of their relationships; while Reba Maybury proposes an erotic analysis of the connection between desire and capitalism.
Le Large rassemble une série de dessins de Julie Beaufils, et trois nouvelles écrites par Michael Van den Abeele, Buck Ellison, et Reba Maybury. Les dessins à l’encre noire suivent une logique de montage, d’accumulation et de suspension narrative: ils ont pour origine des souvenirs de films ou de séries TV, des sédiments d’une culture de masse, ou bien parfois des observations et des moments vécus, cristallisés dans des images. Le designer Scott Ponik a composé avec eux un récit proche du manga, entre abstraction et montage d’attractions. La charge narrative et affective des dessins est encore activée par les trois fictions qui les accompagnent: le texte de Michael Van den Abeele suit les pensées d’un donateur à une banque du sperme; la nouvelle de Buck Ellison raconte quelques heures de la vie d’un groupe d’adolescentes californiennes, leurs relations entre naïveté et cruauté; enfin, le texte de Reba Maybury analyse de manière érotique les liens entre désir et capital.
Texts in English and French / Textes en anglais et en français
Edited by / Direction éditoriale: Benjamin Thorel
Published in collaboration with / Publié avec l'aide de Balice Hertling; and with the support of the / et le soutien du Centre National des Arts Plastiques (CNAP)
B/W, open-spine sewn, with dustjacket / N&B, dos cousu, jaquette
208 pages, 12,5 × 19 cm. Edition of / Tirage: 500
ISBN: 978-2-9559486-1-3
Published by After 8 Books, 2018
Design by Scott Ponik
After 8 Editions / Artists' Books / Literature
