An exhibition of the work of the French Montreal-based artist and architect Francois Dallegret (b. 1937)
Dallegret's own life and work defies anything so predictable as a neat synopsis, but in essence his work beginning in Paris in the late 1950s and early 60s, and later taking in New York and Montreal, absorbs everything from intricate line drawings for a series of astrological vehicles and designs for a number of machines (from those that assist in cooking a meal to others that generate literature) to the 'Home Is Not a House' collaboration with the critic Reyner Banham; a drugstore/gallery in Montreal; proposals for a new Montreal Palais Metro; designs for chairs, more cars and yet more machines; a film collaborative set up to shoot a western; contributions to the Montreal 67 Expo; bars of soap; subversive credit cards; 'ironique' villas and light installations.
Examples of all of this work were on display in the AA Gallery in the form of drawings, photographs, films, cars and a small cosmology of objects designed and produced by Franois Dallegret from 1957 to the present day.
Launched in tandem with the exhibition, the AA also published a catalogue of the show, illustrating a great many of Dallegret's works and also containing texts by Alessandra Ponte, Laurent Stalder and Thomas Weaver.
