Art=Text=Art: Works by Contemporary Artists

Susanna Harwood Rubin, 102 boulevard Haussmann, 2000, graphite on paper, 14 x 31 inches (35.6 x 78.7 cm). © Susanna Harwood Rubin / Photo: Ellen McDermott

Emerging from the scores of vertical graphite striations lining the surface of this drawing, the words 102 boulevard Haussmann denote more than a physical location within the city of Paris. The phrase—an address, a place-name—describes a location in which events and interactions occurred, in which memories were formed, in which experiences were had. Once the residence of the French novelist Marcel Proust (1871-1922), 102 boulevard Haussmann is now a place rife with history, resonating with the significant moments, occasions, and encounters of those who have lived there. The place-name itself has become charged with meaning; the phrase is an evocation of the past, a key to the memories that were produced within the building’s walls.

Susanna Harwood Rubin’s fascination with memory and the ways in which it functions is drawn from her study of Proust and his multi-volume novel Remembrance of Things Past (À la recherché du temps perdu), first published between 1913 and 1927. Proust’s preoccupation with the idea of memory was rooted in his understanding of le temps perdu, or lost time. To Proust, the notion of time was more than a quantitative measure of progress. Rather, it was a qualitative experience that, as it passed, was lost, leaving behind only the sensations felt—the sounds heard, the sights seen, the tastes and the smells. Any fragment of one’s past—be it an object, a location, or a scent—has the power to recall these sensations from deep within one’s subconscious mind. The place-name is an especially powerful prompt for memories. Merely seeing or hearing the words that describe a significant place can summon reminders of events that happened there.

In homage to Proust, Harwood Rubin created evocations of the places he inhabited in Paris. Tracing the author’s movements through the city, Harwood Rubin documented five of his residences, including 102 boulevard Haussmann. As she wrote of her project, “These patterns and designs…became symbols and emblems of their locations, serving as signs for those particular places, and whatever event or conversation had happened there. Each detail was both a container and a trigger for memory.”¹ 102 boulevard Haussmann is a place-name laden with substance and meaning. For the viewer, Harwood Rubin’s drawing encourages meditative reflection and the recollection of site-specific memories.

1. Susanna Harwood Rubin, “Proust Walk,” unpublished artist’s statement, 2000.

Susanna Harwood Rubin discusses 102 boulevard Haussmann. Click here for a transcript.

102 boulevard Haussmann was the primary residence of Marcel Proust in Paris, and to this day the Marcel Proust Society maintains the space as sort of an empty museum to him. I visited it several years ago, just before I created this piece, and it was kind of empty, which is analogous to the way in which I ended up making these drawings, which are these, really these ghostly evocations of the places associated with Proust and with his life. One of the entire volumes of Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past or In Search of Lost Time, whichever title you’d prefer, is called Place-Names. And Place-Names revolves around how a name can spiral out into webs of association and memory based on what the individual brings to it. Every drawing represents a residence or significant place-name from Proust’s book. He deeply explores each one of these in his writing, and the result is my own web of association placed on top of his own. I made this series of drawings in fine lines of graphite so that you can see the numbers and letters, but they still remain ephemeral. They evoke and imply rather than state.