Nicolas Daubanes

In drawings, installations, and sculptures, Nicolas Daubanes uses prison systems as points of departure to show how attempts to impose order and restraint on human expression only fuel resourcefulness and creativity in eluding capture and containment. In his installations, Daubanes uplifts narratives of transgression, especially those recounting revolts against sanctioned injustices in the interest of alleviating individual and collective suffering. Daubanes reduces apparently durable and impenetrable building materials like concrete and iron to broken fragments and delicate filings, using these raw elements to create perishable drawings, sculptures or situations that act as proxies for both the fallibility of human endeavour and the desire for freedom. (Recipient of the prize Amis du Palais de Tokyo, Paris in 2018)