Weeping Lowland 1999, Yechel Gagnon. Carved plywood.

Avoiding the production of yet another brightly painted construction mural, Yechel Gagnon has routered, sanded, ground, and chiseled the wood periphery of the construction lot at 175 rue St. Charles in Vieux-Longueuil into a site-specific piece. Hastening a kind of 'artificial erosion suggestive of topographical forms,' Gagnon's exterior manipulation of the plywood also references the strangely accelerated 'geography' of what is normally hidden from view inside the site walls. By piercing the hoarding with large portholes, Gagnon allows bystanders to glimpse inside and witness the grandeur of an architectural erection. According to a recent press release, 'the public are not only voyeurs of the interior space, but will engage in a tactile experience touching carved surfaces, feeling rough crevices, knots and grains of the wood.'

Appropropriately titled Hoarding, Gagnon's routered plywood can perhaps be considered a kind of 'miniature' - a smaller-scale, tangible example of the bizarre shaping and re-shaping of materials and landscapes that the construction industry engages in on a daily basis and on a global scale. Gagnon is interested in this kind of conversation between materials and events. She says: 'Similarly to a building, my piece will grow homogeneously within the city's topography; the wood will become weathered, vandalism will affect the structure, graffiti will be added to the already present gouged marks, and media posters will be glued to the carved surface, adding yet more layers of complexity in the plywood. It is these specific factors which will make Hoarding become one within the urban core.'

To see Hoarding , cross the Jacques Cartier bridge and follow directions to rue St-Charles. If coming by metro, head to Longueuil/Université de Sherbrooke and take bus # 8, #28, or #88 and get off at the corner of St-Alexandre, approximately 5 minute bus ride from the metro.