The artist
“I have been a friend of Stef Van Looveren for fourteen years, says Sylvie Kreusch. We went to the same school, to the same underground parties. I saw him become the artist he is today, exploring video, photography, sculpture … His installations question the performativity of human behavior, mainly within the framework of the notion of gender. In a playful way, imitating social behavior and visual culture, his work is oriented towards a surrealist gesture. “
The couple
“The man in the picture, continues Sylvie Kreusch, literally – and figuratively – lost his mind. Yet she clings to him, because it is too difficult to say goodbye to him. His head floats in a sea of blood / red hair. “ Et Stef Van Looveren the completer : “We tried to create something iconic. At the time I was preparing a series of sculptures for an exhibition where I used a technique of photogrammetry to digitize some of my friends which were modeled using computer generated imagery to then be transformed into physical sculptures. This process was the basis of the sleeve of Montbray, with the ambition to succeed in representing the many aspects of Sylvie’s existence, emotions and sound. ”
The sculpture
“Sylvie, naked, was scanned in the company of a male model, vulnerable, but strong and confident, pour suit Stef Van Looveren. The scene is as much a moment of abandonment as of rebirth. The staging of a moment of life and death with this decapitated character giving an ambiguous feeling, but not devoid of hope. The sculpture was then painted by hand, choosing brilliant, sensual and mysterious colors, as Sylvie is in life. After finishing the sculpture, I photographed it from all angles, then we worked together with Sylvie to create the digitally drawn universe in which it is posed. A digital landscape dripping like a paradise of bloody red wine. ”
The title
“This image, Sylvie concludes, summarizes the story that my album tells. A love story, just like the record. Montbray is a small town in Normandy in France where I composed during two months of confinement following a painful rupture. The time I spent there with a group of friends, the region and the surrounding nature, influenced the sound, the production and the look of the record. “
