[Summer 2025]

Je suis devenu le volcan
by Reno Salvail

[EXCERPT]

Je suis devenu le volcan is a unique object that can’t be categorized easily. It is part artist book, part retrospective monograph. It alternates, literally, between photographs and contact sheets by Reno Salvail (1947–2023) and analyses, neither solely descriptive nor purely poetic, written by Eveline Boulva, Sylvain Campeau, and Jean Arrouye. Intimate and yet vo­luminous, it is a posthumous work – although Salvail had been making plans to publish it, as suggested by his dedication at the beginning: “I offer this book to Lise, the love of my life and the companion on all my creative adventures. – R. S.”

To the three texts mentioned above, a fourth closes the book: excerpts from Salvail’s journal, which explain the highly personal tone not only of the book – the title contains the word “Je,” after all – but of his entire practice, which extended from 1986 to 2023, as we can see in the index at the back of the volume. The way in which the bodies of work interweave with and break up the texts may thus be inspired by the idea of a private diary – one that is filled in fits and starts, depending on the time and availability of the person making the entries.

[…]

[ Complete issue, in print and digital version, available here: Ciel variable 129 – FROM CONTINENT TO CONTINENT ]
[ Complete article in digital version available here: Reno Salvail, Je suis devenu le volcan]

Freelance journalist Jérôme Delgado is the publishing coordinator at Ciel variable.