I Am Your Voice
Claire Fontaine

For We The People Are The Work Fontaine produced a series of new works that tackle questions of morality, agency and freedom of speech through illuminated text works in Karst’s main gallery and a monumental matchstick map of The United Kingdom in the gallery’s front space.

Lifting quotes directly from pioneering British psychiatrist RD Laing, Donald Trump and the Brexit process for her neon and LED signs, Fontaine created a visual and conceptual polyphony where the viewer is invited to take a position. Expressing a crisis of judgment and a confusion of moral values, the text works in the exhibition contained ambiguous messages about our desires and the means that we use to fulfil them.

Conceived by the artist as the trace of an action that we witness in the aftermath, the sign of a tragedy that we perceived too late, the map, UK (Burnt/Unburnt), was incinerated prior to the opening of the exhibition to the public. It was at once a painting made by the fire, a sculpture of the country and a political statement about its potential future in increasingly uncertain political times.

Claire Fontaine’s commission was supported by Fluxus Art Projects​, the Franco-British charity dedicated to supporting exhibitions by contemporary artists from both countries.

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I Am Your Voice was commissioned as part of We The People Are The Work, a major visual arts project curated by Simon Morrissey, Director of Foreground and presented by PVAPG (Plymouth Visual Art Programming Group), a partnership between The Gallery at Plymouth College of Art, KARST, Peninsula Arts at Plymouth University, Plymouth Arts Centre and The Box, Plymouth.

The exhibition is part of Horizon, a collaborative two-year programme of visual contemporary arts, funded through Arts Council England’s Ambition for Excellence fund and led by Plymouth Culture.