Équivalence : un coup de dés jamais n’abolira le hasard (2003)

Équivalence: Un coup de Dés jamais n’abolira le Hasard (2003)
Stéphane Mallarmé, Guido Molinari; preface, Jocelyne Légaré; interview, Julia Duchastel.
Portfolio of 26 loose folded leaves. Portfolio: H339 x W256 mm. Leaves: H336 x W250 mm.
Les Éditions du Passage, Montréal. Acquired from Reynaud-Bray, March 2019. © Guido Molinari. Photos: Books On Books Collection. Displayed with permission of Fondation Guido Molinari.

Molinari’s rendition of Un coup de Dés sings among the versions by Marcel Broodthaers (1969), Geraldo de Barros (1986) and Ellsworth Kelly (1992).

In the first three minutes of this extract from the film Molinari: la couleur chante (2005), Molinari walks through an exhibition of Équivalence, discussing it with Roald Nasgaard and commenting on Un coup de Dés, its visual musicality and his transformation of it into his colourful geometric abstractions. The opportunity to see all of the poem ranged along one wall and all of Molinari’s abstractions along a facing wall is a pleasure. A pleasure enhanced by leafing through the portfolio and juxtaposing each double-page spread of the poem with Molinari’s “equivalent” abstraction.

Update

At the Guido Molinari Foundation’s exhibition Sophie Lanctôt, Mallarmé, Molinari: Mots Croisés (6 June – 25 August 2024), a previously undiscovered artist’s book by Molinari appeared for the first time in thirty years:

Continuum pour Mallarmé (1994)

Images courtesy of Fondation Guido Molinari. Photos: Michael Patten. Especial thanks to artist Sophie Lanctôt and curator Monic Robillard.

Note in this earlier work how the text is integrated with artwork, omitting the later work’s intermediate homage to Broodthaers.

Continuum pour Mallarmé was created for a group show of 47 books by renowned artists such as Louise Robert, Michel Goulet, Irene F. Whittome and Rober Racine, presented at AXENÉO-7 in Gatineau from March 27 to April 24, 1994, under the title De causis et tractatibus. Each artist was free to choose his or her subject. Molinari chose Mallarmé’s poem. 

“The idea of a fictional encyclopedic project arose during a conversation between Marie-Jeanne Musiol and Richard Gagnier about the creation of artist’s books. Each of the artists received an identically crafted book with a closed dimension of 33.8 x 26.5 x 1.4 cm (13 ¼ x 10 ½ x ½ in.). The interior consists of six sheets of white BFK Reeves paper folded in quarters and sewn together. (…) The title of the encyclopedia and the volume’s serial number, in Roman numerals, are pressed into the cover and repeated in the same way on the inside title page,” writes Richard Gagnier in 3 manières d’instruire l’inventaire, published by Le Sabord in 1998. Continuum pour Mallarmé by Guido Molinari is number 44. — Exhibition notes provided by Monic Robillard.

Further Reading

Molinari, Guido, Gilles Daigneault, Patrick Lafontaine. Nul mot: les livres d’artiste de Guido Molinari (Montréal, Québec: Éditions du Noroît, 2017).

Nasgaard, Roald. Abstract Painting in Canada (D&M Publishers Inc., 2008).

Bénichou, Anne, Olivier Asselin, Camille Bouchi, and Axe Néo-7 art contemporain. 1998. 3 Manières D’instruire L’inventaire : En Hommage À Un Cadeau D’eva Hesse À Sol Lewitt : De Causis Et Tractatibus : En Cause, Brancusi. Trois-Rivières, Québec: Le Sabord.