Surround
18 Oct 2014 - 23 Mar 2015
SURROUND
Une exposition-atelier de Malachi Farrell pour les 3-10 ans
18 October 2014 - 23 March 2015
Since his discovery of electronic art in the Nineties, Franco-Irish artist Malachi Farrell has been producing astonishing, singular machines that illustrate his political, social and ecological combats. At the invitation of the Centre Pompidou, the artist has devised an interactive exhibition-workshop especially for children aged 3 to 10. He takes over the Galerie des Enfants, creating a sound and visual poetic journey based on one of his main preoccupations: the environment. Children, their awareness raised by schools, families and the media, also feel concerned by the destruction of the planet: they realise the imperative urgency of acting to save a world polluted, destroyed and tarnished by adults.
With "Surround", Malachi Farrell writes a contemporary fable full of generosity, humour and mischief, structured into three successive worlds. The Galerie des Enfants invites audiences to immerse themselves in first the ocean, then a forest walk and finally an exploration of the urban world. At the entrance, children and adults, comfortably ensconced in deckchairs, are cradled by the soft sound of "ocean drums". The dream is not far from reality – and this soon catches up with the visitors and leads them to wonder if the sea is clean, and what they can do to take action: all fundamental questions that children ask themselves and us.
Further on, in the heart of the exhibition, visitors enter a thick forest made of fish skeletons and milk bottles, which come to life as they pass through. As living beings or ordinary recycled waste, these organic and plastic castoffs are a half-amused, half-disillusioned glance at our future – one that is not far away.
Lastly, the tough, noisy, constantly-moving urban world appears in the form of the theatre. Hanging pipes, dressed in the clothing of Mr and Mrs Average Person, abandon themselves to a mechanical, impish, syncopated dance. A way of seeing human beings as disenchanted robots or machines for recycling. For Malachi Farrell, "beauty [lies] in the driving force – in the literal and figurative sense, in what puts things in movement, in what illustrates life and its variations. And the art of today lies in the possibility of recreating life through recycling, for instance. Through art works, one develops driving forces – beauty is a driving force; it consists of so many different definitions. Art also makes it possible to be a constructor, to live, to make things live again and share a common emotion."
During their visit, children are invited to appropriate the artist's vision in hands-on experiments, creating and producing short films and animated images that can be shown in the praxinoscopes (optical toys) provided to them. In this way, they can lead adults to an idyllic environment – the kind of environment you dream of when you are five years old.
Organiser : Direction des publics, Catherine Boireau
Une exposition-atelier de Malachi Farrell pour les 3-10 ans
18 October 2014 - 23 March 2015
Since his discovery of electronic art in the Nineties, Franco-Irish artist Malachi Farrell has been producing astonishing, singular machines that illustrate his political, social and ecological combats. At the invitation of the Centre Pompidou, the artist has devised an interactive exhibition-workshop especially for children aged 3 to 10. He takes over the Galerie des Enfants, creating a sound and visual poetic journey based on one of his main preoccupations: the environment. Children, their awareness raised by schools, families and the media, also feel concerned by the destruction of the planet: they realise the imperative urgency of acting to save a world polluted, destroyed and tarnished by adults.
With "Surround", Malachi Farrell writes a contemporary fable full of generosity, humour and mischief, structured into three successive worlds. The Galerie des Enfants invites audiences to immerse themselves in first the ocean, then a forest walk and finally an exploration of the urban world. At the entrance, children and adults, comfortably ensconced in deckchairs, are cradled by the soft sound of "ocean drums". The dream is not far from reality – and this soon catches up with the visitors and leads them to wonder if the sea is clean, and what they can do to take action: all fundamental questions that children ask themselves and us.
Further on, in the heart of the exhibition, visitors enter a thick forest made of fish skeletons and milk bottles, which come to life as they pass through. As living beings or ordinary recycled waste, these organic and plastic castoffs are a half-amused, half-disillusioned glance at our future – one that is not far away.
Lastly, the tough, noisy, constantly-moving urban world appears in the form of the theatre. Hanging pipes, dressed in the clothing of Mr and Mrs Average Person, abandon themselves to a mechanical, impish, syncopated dance. A way of seeing human beings as disenchanted robots or machines for recycling. For Malachi Farrell, "beauty [lies] in the driving force – in the literal and figurative sense, in what puts things in movement, in what illustrates life and its variations. And the art of today lies in the possibility of recreating life through recycling, for instance. Through art works, one develops driving forces – beauty is a driving force; it consists of so many different definitions. Art also makes it possible to be a constructor, to live, to make things live again and share a common emotion."
During their visit, children are invited to appropriate the artist's vision in hands-on experiments, creating and producing short films and animated images that can be shown in the praxinoscopes (optical toys) provided to them. In this way, they can lead adults to an idyllic environment – the kind of environment you dream of when you are five years old.
Organiser : Direction des publics, Catherine Boireau