Structured room by room, the Motherboard exhibit revolves around microarchitectures using motherboards to depict cities. This universe spans multiple mediums, including relief photography, sculpture and video art. The artist approaches digital phenomena from an aesthetic and anthropological angle.
METROPOLIS
METROPOLIS (DETAIL)
Hot and Cold Exhalations, Big Bang is both the original blast and the sustained explosion of desire. From hot to cold, like the ever-expanding universe that is cooling down.
BIG BANG
BIG BANG (DETAIL)
Color-shifting paint that changes color depending on the viewing angle. This effect is achieved through the use of pearlescent particles or specialized pigments that refract light, creating a dynamic visual shift. As the viewing angle changes, the light reflects differently, resulting in a shift in perceived color.
ARTIST STUDIO
ARCHITECTONICS
DIGITAL SKYLINES
CHICAGO RIVER (DETAIL)
DIGITAL RELICS
NEO CITY
The urban microstructure resulting from this geoaesthetic reorganization of motherboards seems to imitate the open-pit mines where precious metals are extracted. By turning several of the works included in this series into monochromes, we find ourselves before a relief sculpture that is both composite and uniform, as though we have lost the ability to distinguish between the two. As though time had let its anthracite, golden, silvery, or reddish dust settle onto the city surface.
MONOCHROME CITIES - NEW YORK
MONOCHROME CITIES - NEW YORK (DETAIL)
Their scale itself creates a form of discourse, as their material is sourced from a microscopic world that extends by multiplying and emulating an “ancient” order, that of cities and communication networks, infrastructures, roads, lanes, and channels. The occupation of space by this segment of the city creates a sprawl that extends beyond this space. A physical encroachment that turns into an emotional one.
MONOCHROME CITIES - PARIS
MONOCHROME CITIES - PARIS (DETAIL)
MONOCHROME CITIES - MONTREAL
MONOCHROME CITIES - MONTREAL (DETAIL)
"In my view, it is merely a question of scale, as motherboards are comprised of the same elements as cities — the large avenues and their monuments, the highways and their junctions, the malls and their vast parking lots, the stadiums, the train stations, the industrial and residential areas, and the green spaces that find their way, all at once safe havens and pockets of resistance to standardization."
- Nicolas Ruel
MONOCHROME CITIES - ARTIST STUDIO
MONOCHROME CITIES - ANTHRACITE
With his macroscopic approach, Nicolas Ruel turns the sculptural object that is the motherboard into a photographic subject. This series of coloured “portraits” is a clear reference to pop art, swapping the popular icons immortalized by Andy Warhol for microprocessors. The photographic print consisting in several layers of ink on a stainless-steel surface creates a texture that enhances the intrinsic presence and nature of these so-called printed circuits.
ON-LINE
PARTITION
CHROMATIC
AMPLITUDE
X-RAY
LOGOFF
THINK DIFFERENT
SYNERGY
CIRCUITRY
The technological turn we are experiencing has several faces. A central processor manages the information just like the human brain uses data made available to it by the senses. By photographing CPUs, by enlarging them and arranging them to form a mosaic, Nicolas Ruel creates another series of portraits, as though each CPU has its own unique personality. The intertwining effect resulting from this expansion, a sort of electronic tatami, is an interplay between uniformity and diversity.
CPU (DETAIL)
TRILLIONS
INFINITE SCALE
MOTHERBOARD PROJECT BY THE VISUAL ARTIST NICOLAS RUEL
Tracking shot across micro-cities. As though you were there. Fascination and monotony. Standardized environments, all identical in their difference: each of them monochrome, one-dimensional, trapped within its own code. Where confinement and communication blend together.
FROM PARIS TO METROPOLIS
Nicolas Ruel has been the subject of numerous solo and group exhibitions around the world. His works have been presented in leading contemporary art fairs, and have been included in several public and private collections (Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal, Museum Europäischer Kulturen in Berlin, Brooklyn Museum, Kunsthalle in Munich, Dongdaemun Design Plaza in Seoul, Swedish Centre Architecture and Design in Stockholm, Musée des arts décoratifs in Paris).
Ruel has pushed the boundaries of photography by adopting a formal approach that engages in a complex dialogue with architecture, urban planning, and culture. Utilizing double exposure techniques, his images become visual documentaries that capture the duality of time. This artistic approach is strengthened by the pronounced materiality of his large format works, printed on stainless steel, a crucial choice for his artistic signature.
In his recent micro-architectural works, the city ceases to be a subject and becomes an object. With MOTHERBOARD, he places matter at the forefront of his artistic reflection. By assembling discarded motherboards, he transforms remnants of obsolete machines into large-scale installations of imaginary urban landscapes. These monumental pictorial works undergo a scale shift, moving from micro to macro, inviting the viewer to introspect in front of their immensity. Thus, Ruel creates a distinctive hybrid art form, merging elements of sculpture, painting, installation, and photography. Beyond his creative ingenuity, this project contributes to the sustainability debate by using recycled materials in artistic expression.
ARTIST STUDIO
ARTIST STUDIO
"Motherboard: the digital world is built from the inside out, like our cities. This inspired me to create a new language, a new aesthetic presented in several mediums, with motherboards as its epicenter, whose territory extends further than we can imagine."
- Nicolas Ruel
MONTREAL
STUDIO
Nicolas Ruel Inc.
5455, rue de Bordeaux, H2H 2P9
Montréal, Canada
PARIS
ATELIER (appointment on request)
9, rue Delambre, 75014
Paris, France
COMMUNICATION/PR
Noémie de Rothschild
+1 514 815 6942
noemie@ndrcom.ca
GENERAL INQUIRIES
info@motherboard.art
SOCIAL MEDIA
Natalie Cola
PRODUCTION & PHOTO EDITOR
Jean Blais
COORDINATOR & STUDIO OPERATIONS
Sebastien Forand
NICOLAS RUEL WEBSITE
nicolasruel.com