LEY LINE (RUE DE LA RÉPUBLIQUE

LEY LINE (RUE DE LA RÉPUBLIQUE

Acrylic on Found Granite Paving Stone
Dimensions: 30.3cm X 40cm X 5cm
Charlie Warde, 2021

Ley Line (Rue de la République) is a freestanding acrylic painting on a found granite paving stone base from Rue de la République. The piece questions what is real and what is fake and how manufactured narratives become mythology, ultimately adding to ‘sense of place’.

Rue de la République was created as a thoroughfare to connect the Joliette Port and the Vieux Port. To enable construction, parts of the Panier were blasted through, and according to local legend, the southern end of the road was cursed on account of the nave of Église Saint-Ferréol being chopped off and shortened.

Ley Line (Rue de la République) questions the authenticity of materials. The top half of the
sculpture is made entirely of acrylic paint. Warde makes his own paint using acrylic mediums and artist pigments, including titanium white and lead white. Lead white has been used throughout art history as the de facto white; it has recently been replaced by titanium white which absorbs
ultraviolet light rather than reflecting it. The difference between the two whites is activated under dark ultraviolet light – a technique used to determine forgeries. The effect creates a ghostly apparition in line with Rue de la République’s cursed psychogeographical status.