Every Day is Picture day

PREFACE BY ALAIN COFINO GOMEZ | 2020 Between Where’s Waldo and the hellish scenes of Hieronymus Bosch, there lies a territory that calls itself a kingdom and seems like a vast, colorful chaos; it is here that a chaos of our own is organized, under the gaze of an obsessed observer, Lucas Racasse. One might think that these human landscapes, these faces and bodies, are there to entertain us like a good horror film, or to awaken us from our civic and political torpor as the true discourse of wisdom. But on closer, long, and precise examination, it actually appears that Lucas’s work is more complex than that. The creator seems to hold up not a mirror, but rather a painting long abandoned in an attic—a forgotten portrait—Dorian Gray’s portrait. A portrait of what rots in the shelter and preserves us, immaculate and smooth, in the world. Here, then, is our collective Dorian Gray finally revealed and offered for scrutiny, this monstrosity built from our cowardice, compromises, and hatreds, while our bodies and social faces roam the world in eternal moral and aesthetic youth. In the attic, forgotten, the bewitched canvas stores our horrors and spares us the burden of bearing their scars in daily life. This is without counting on artists like Lucas, who strive to reveal what we have collectively become. But Lucas does not stop at simply revealing our monstrous clown; he stages his visions in jubilant frescoes that dare juxtaposition. He enjoys confronting, within the same space, ideas and temporalities that have only coexisted in his mind. A vast bath of gods from all religions, a historical and multi-temporal boxing ring, or a hell for the rich between rubble and a morbid amusement park. This creator brings together disparate elements of an incredible discourse because in his kingdom, he twists space and time with collages and digital painting to tell the essence of our times—uncompromisingly, mercilessly, sometimes with love, sometimes with disgust. Whether in his acts of revelation or in his gatherings of space and time, Lucas spares no one and transgresses taboos to reveal the obvious. The Wall Street Bull is everywhere, ruling our world in shadows or broad daylight, just as it is clear that finance itself has taken over our democracies. The Nazis skewering elections across Europe are cowardly and perverted—the exact opposite of the morality and order they claim to uphold. Lucas is also a man of quotation and homage. His work is an exercise in borrowing and recreation. The Masters and Mistresses of art are there, watching over him, and he enjoys gathering them within the space-time heart of his kingdom, in protesting crowds or in a heavenly parliament where endless debates about art unfold. Between praise and lampoon, esteem and contempt, Lucas’s works bear witness to both his great love and great hatred for humanity, which he seems to observe from a vantage point a little removed from the fray. While maintaining a safe distance from the world to depict its organic and colorful aspects, he is sometimes in touch with his subject—for example, Belgium and Belgianness. Here again, he draws from the absurd and psychoanalytic “Belgian school” in his wordplay variations. Once again, he takes the liberty of inviting the who’s who of Belgium into a selection of personalities resembling him: uncompromising, authentic, and crazy Belgians. For five years, I had the pleasure of sharing creative moments with Lucas as part of the communications team for the theater I direct. It’s another game we both enjoy: the game of commissioning. It’s a game that confronts him with the other and undoubtedly removes him from his own realm to extract tools he can use in service of others. And at this game, I admit he excels. He knows how to hear the hidden message in the commissioner’s words, accompany them, and surprise with bold proposals of cutting and piquant relevance. He has genius and never tires of calling on it, often alone in the dead of night before the glowing white screen. Finally, I won’t end without saying that, of course, this guy has flaws—but that is an understatement to say he has the flaws of his virtues, and that his love for others, as well as his disgust for others, sometimes expresses itself without restraint with the moving authenticity of an observer who finds it difficult to remain passive in the face of beauty or catastrophe. ALAIN COFINO GOMEZ Author & Director of the Théâtre des Doms (Avignon) | 20015-2024