Drawings by artist duo À Deux Doigts

Nantes-based artists Anne Chamberland and Grégoire Canut, collaborating under the name of à deux doigts, highlight in their pencil and charcoal on paper drawings a world of perverted innocence and corrupted youth, where childhood activities get a dark twist, turned into games of power, and the playground becomes a place of torture of the weak.

The fragile age of the children depicted in the works contrasts their cruelty and joy of causing suffering, perhaps unconscious of the consequences of their actions and the permanent psychological trauma resulting from this dehumanizing process, sometimes fatal to those who are forced to submit to this treatment or passively accept to endure it. There is no way to fit in the group, you are either winner or loser, without an option to change the roles. At the same time, the moment of self-discovery and state of confusion in understanding the body, mostly specific to the teen period, is reflected by the duo in the exploration of one’s own desires, identity and sexuality.

Placing the child at the heart of the story, the works bring into discussion unsettling issues of today, while exposing the dismal, sick and often tragic nature of relationships in a society of those who rule and those who obey, with no questions asked and not the slightest intention to revolt, challenge and overcome the absurdity of an imposed and alienating condition.