The web of community ties formed within a city often coincides with the geographical boundaries of a neighbourhood, where proximity makes our daily activities conducive to exchange. Seeking to step out of traditional exhibition spaces the Fovea collective has decided to approach the cohabitation of art and the community by placing it within this neighbourhood setting. Tour de Villeneuve, which takes place in shops or on particular streets of the Villeneuve street block, avoids the spectacular in order to discreetly infiltrate the daily life of the neighbourhood’s residents. The reason Fovea teamed up with the local shopkeepers is because they are the cornerstones of community activity. Their shop spaces, more intimate than those of department stores, foster interaction between individuals, and thus assure the perpetuation of communication.

Within the context of an in situ art, or more aptly a public intra-muros art approach, the artists sought inspiration in the particularities of each shop, and through their respective visions, tried to bring out the "spirit of the place". Some of the works are formally integrated into the space, sometimes to the point of being camouflaged, while others delve into the history of the shop and shopkeepers as their point of departure. Certain works invite contemplation, others call for manipulation, and some even become utilitarian objects. They all share an invocation of different aspects of memory. Reminiscence or amnesia, intimate or collective memory, the remembrance and evocation of a past that is more or less recent, and archival references are the avenues taken by the Fovea artists as they put their reflection on in situ photography to work.

The laundry ritual is charged with cycles and circular movements that ultimately refer to time. Inspired by the laundromat owners’ origins, Cosmogonies creates a parallel between this cyclical universe and Hindu iconography. Through a delicate manipulation of these symbols and their adaptation to a contemporary art context, the work proposes a coloured reorganisation of the laundromat’s white and monotonous interior. Waiting is transformed into a meditation on the concentric rhythms of life. The creative process and the technique behind Cosmogonies also reference the intersection of cultural identities in the heart of a city.

In integrating a place one also adopts both its essence and functional logic. In a second-hand boutique, accumulation and clutter are natural, and each new element that is added easily slips into the already existing array.

This also applies to the sculptures Histoire de temps et d’espace en suspens [A History of Suspended Time and Space] whose strange and playful forms fit in perfectly with the place. Made from everyday objects the sculptures integrate images that could belong to the memory of all travellers. The work invites the passerby to play and relish in the pleasures of discovery.

Behind the rows of immobile bicycles, rural landscapes pass by our eyes. In showing images taken from the peripheral vision of a cyclist, the installation recreates a trajectory traversed in fast pace mode. In this overcharged space where the bicycles’ movement is relegated to a past memory or a future excursion, the "mobility" of the work creates an intriguing paradox. The result irrevocably inspires a desire for nature, escape and freedom.