Chris Dougnac, Tech Demo #1 [Et en Arcadia Ego II (The Shepherds of Arcadia), 1638], 2022. House paint on canvas, 48 x 48 inches. Courtesy of the artist.
In Temple, Rock, Cloud, interdisciplinary artist Chris Dougnac reimagines Gallery 825 in the Louvre Museum, which houses select “masterpieces” by French Baroque artist Nicolas Poussin, as a ready-made work of art. For the exhibition, Dougnac meditates on chroma key green screen paint, commonly used in film and TV to isolate a subject from their background, and its implications as a technological medium. Through installation, painting, sound sculpture, and performance, Dougnac transforms the gallery into an immersive site that renders the viewer, wittingly or otherwise, into the subject of an indeterminate and undefined scene.
Dougnac’s paintings are monochromatic “translations” of the thirteen paintings by Nicolas Poussin in Gallery 825. Poussin was best known for his landscape compositions, depicting historical figures of antiquity in the Classical tradition. One of the paintings, Et en Arcadia Ego II (The Arcadian Shepherds), whose enigmatic title roughly translates to “Even in Arcadia, I am,” alludes to the certainty of death, even in the context of an idyllic utopia.
Punctuating the development of the vanitas motif from still life to landscape exemplified by Poussin’s oeuvre, Dougnac explores the green paint’s implications as an inert plastic medium charged with both creative and destructive potentiality. By eliminating the subjects of the original tableaus, Dougnac’s paintings convert sites of historical “happenings” to empty landscapes. This omission is a fundamental reversal of the green screen, a medium centered on juxtaposition and superimposition around the subject. Twelve of the thirteen paintings are installed to imitate their exact presentations at the Louvre. The effect is both disorienting and comical, highlighting the spatial and contextual differences between the Swenson Gallery and Gallery 825 in the Louvre.
Adding to this disorienting effect is the barely perceptible low-frequency audio emanating from the rock sculpture in the center of the gallery. The sculpture disguises an active cinematic subwoofer, a speaker with the capacity to emit infrasound frequencies below the audible human range of 20 hertz (Hz). Commonly referred to as the "ghost frequency” since the 1990s, 18.9 Hz is the resonant frequency of the human eyeball known to cause physiological visual aberrations. By using the “ghost frequency” to simulate “superficial paranormal environments” that in turn activate genuine paranormal activity, Dougnac adopts the modality of a paranormal investigator. This optical effect may cause some to see "ghosts," which when projected onto the paintings, reinstate the missing subjects of the empty landscapes.
Dougnac queries our relationship to art and technology as interfaces with the spiritual and sublime. Rather than functioning exclusively as objects intended for interpretation, the paintings function as devices that transpose and reposition the viewer. When activated by the sound sculpture, they are no longer static placeholders, but portals that allow for the transference of varied meanings.
Temple, Rock, Cloud will be activated throughout its duration by instructional performances in which Dougnac will lead a group of security guards to embody the roles of art handler, gallery interpreter, curator, and even paranormal investigator. Through the performances, Dougnac offers a pointed institutional critique that questions the artist's role within the context of the art institution and the public at large.
Courtesy of Bakehouse Art Complex. Filmed by Preguntas Studio, 2023.
About the artist
Chris Dougnac (b. 1994, Miami, FL) is a first-generation Cuban-American artist living and working in Miami, FL. In 2016, they received a BFA in Art and a minor in Art History from Florida International University. Since 2018, Dougnac has worked as the Archivist and Graphic Designer at the de la Cruz Collection in Miami, FL, where they work closely with collectors Rosa and Carlos de la Cruz to manage the collection database, social media, and design and installation of all exhibitions. They have been a resident artist at Bakehouse Art Complex since 2019.