Musée d’art de Joliette

Zoe Ann Cardinal Cire, Patrick Cruz, Louis-Charles Dionne, Nicolas Fleming, Bernie Goulem, Jake Kimble, Marlon Kroll, Clara Lacasse, Mea Bissett and Selina Latour, Richard Ibghy and Marilou Lemmens, Frédérique Ulman-Gagné and Jacinthe Loranger, Fiona Nguyen, Studio Rat, Émile Riopel, Aman Sandhu, Jem Woolidge

L'art de perruquer / Parallel Play features sixteen artists and artist duos – divided between two venues – who use everyday materials, gestures, and references to play on artistic and institutional codes. This reflection on creation and exhibition spaces is the result of a collaboration between two curators and between two institutions, each of which has a distinct history but is deeply rooted in its community: the Stewart Hall Art Gallery, housed in a former manor converted into a cultural centre, and the Musée d'art de Joliette, which is celebrating its fiftieth anniversary this year.

The exhibition’s title is inspired by the concept of perruquage, developed by Michel de Certeau in his book L’Invention du quotidien (1980). The term refers to how labourers discreetly divert time, tools, and resources from their work to create freely, as an artist would do. It is a modest, often invisible creative gesture, but one that gently resists the established order and the prescribed usage of things.

Emulating this crafty ingenuity, the artists in L’art de perruquer / Parallel Play work from “inside.” They transform rules and constraints into opportunities by bringing the mundane into the heart of the museum and the gallery and, through skilful digressions, imbuing it with poetry and wonder. Familiar objects, found items, DIY projects, quirky perspectives – through these materials and means, what is private and ordinary invades the exhibition space, making the institutional context itself a creative medium.

Curators : ​Manel Benchabane and Ariane De Blois​

Artists presented at the MAJ

Zoe Ann Cardinal Cire, Patrick Cruz, Louis-Charles Dionne, Jake Kimble, Marlon Kroll, Richard Ibghy and Marilou Lemmens, Fiona Nguyen, Studio Rat, Émile Riopel, Aman Sandhu, Jem Woolidge.

The exhibition will also be presented at the Stewart Hall Art Gallery from July 4 to August 30, 2026. The opening reception will take place on July 5, from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. For more information, visit the Stewart Hall Art Gallery website.