Proxy Gallery contains photos of fragments of photos taken from an undisclosed fashion magazine. The photos have been manipulated: the artist has hand-drawn a black outline around the letters of the word “tragedy,” and a decorative pattern in the photos has been intensified in yellow and aquamarine enamel lines in a herringbone pattern. The photos themselves are split into 2 levels: the large photo is pushed back and the small one, a closeup, stands about an inch forward and isolates the word “aged” from Tr-aged-y. On the corner of both fragments is a fragment of a fashion model’s manicured fingers.

For Vallée, the role of writing is to emphasize design as a fiction that is all around us and constructs our reality. Fashion is high design both in the clothing and in the photograph itself.

The word tragedy in isolation might refer to something tragic -aging? or, as in Greek Tragedy, it may stand for theatrical action, for fiction. The installation suggests that some mythic tragedy is happening outside the frame of both the photographs and the gallery itself. Elaborating on the dialogue between fiction and truth, Vallee brings design forward and leaves the female body in the margin and in the background, in such a way as to call attention to its presence and absence.