100% silk, digital print, width 140 cm, roll of 20 m
production La BF15
Tout le service dysfonctionne. (The all service is jammed.)
Si tu parles, je parle.
Les trois marches légales (The three legal steps)
During the fall 2016, J. Kaeppelin created a system to produce some fabrics with topical decorations (étoffes à décor de circonstance). The social and political uses of textiles motivated the artist to reclaim an ancient tradition in decorative arts and textile industry. The production of these étoffes à décor de circonstance involves “fabrics intentionally decorated in a way that recalls an important event contemporaneous with their production, or a circumstance of lesser amplitude but notable all the same, or the glory or actions of a great character.”*
The first edition produced of étoffes à décor de circonstance use some textual and visual materials resulting from the audit made by the artist-service provider in Le Magasin CNAC in August 2016. She draws attention on three contemporary facts related to the world of work: the dysfunction of a system, the overregulation and speaking conditions. Three sentences name the three patterns:
Si tu parles, je parle. (If you talk, I talk.)
Les trois marches légales (The three legal steps)
Tout le service dysfonctionne. (The all service is jammed.)
The symptomatic and poetic patterns are digitally printed on silk, a soft and flexible material that can be worn. Three texts written by Mathilde Sauzet Mattei** come together with the fabrics, and add a fictional and off the wall dimensions.
The fabrics have been produced in partnership with two textile companies in Lyon (FR): Brochier Soieries and Bisson Sa. Each drawing has been printed in a roll of 20 meters. The fabrics are for sale per meter for the price of 200 €/m.
* The term "étoffes à décor de circonstance" and its definition are extracted from the journal La Soierie of Lyon dating from 1921.
** Mathilde Sauzet Mattei (FR, 1987), curator and artist, co-founder with Cécile Roche Boutin of Les Commissaires Anonymes, unity of artistic research and action.