Canoes

Created for The Wrong Shop, The Canoe Series by Philippe Weisbecker began with an invitation to contribute to a collective exhibition in the French harbour city of Lorient. Having collected folk art, ships and boats for many years, Weisbecker realised that, despite this long fascination, he had never actually drawn one. What began as a simple idea soon became a turning point in his practice.

At first, the drawings did not come easily. After several weeks of working on the subject, he felt he was getting nowhere and considered abandoning the project altogether. Yet the idea stayed with him. He began looking again, not at large vessels or seagoing ships, but at smaller skiffs, canoes and freshwater boats. These modest structures revealed something that resonated deeply with him. Each was like a half shell, empty, floating quietly on the surface of the water. In these forms he recognised two essential ideas that have guided his work for decades: the relationship between full and empty, and between what is exposed and what is hidden.

From this discovery came a series of works that are as much about perception as they are about drawing. Each canoe is rendered with calm precision, reduced to its most elemental lines and shapes. The drawings are composed with a sense of balance and rhythm that feels at once analytical and deeply human. They are studies in form, proportion and silence, inviting the viewer to contemplate the quiet poetry of the everyday.

True to Weisbecker’s practice, material plays a crucial role. The drawings are made on used Udon noodle sacks collected from his favourite noodle shop in Japan. The printed textures, creases and small imperfections of the sacks become part of the work, giving each piece a sense of history and lived experience. The combination of delicate line work and humble surface transforms these everyday materials into objects of rare beauty and thoughtfulness.

In The Canoe Series, Weisbecker captures the fragile equilibrium between presence and absence, structure and void, idea and material. What might at first seem simple reveals, upon closer reflection, a profound meditation on time, use and the enduring value of quiet observation.