- As part of its call for applications, BMW ART MAKERS is supporting
a duo of an emerging visual artist and a curator to create a project. - The duo will begin work in February and the project will be
presented at the Rencontres d’Arles in summer 2024, then at Paris
Photo in November 2024. - BMW Group France is offering a grant of €10,000 to the artist, a
grant of €8,000 to the curator and a research and production budget
of €15,000, followed by a solo exhibition at the Rencontres d’Arles
and Paris Photo, of which BMW is an official partner.
Paris. Artist Mustapha Azeroual and curator
Marjolaine Lévy were unanimously selected by the jury to develop
their project “The Green Ray” as part of the BMW ART MAKERS program.
The jury was composed of Florence Bourgeois, director
of Paris Photo, Hervé Digne, president of Poush-Manifesto, Chantal
Nedjib, founder of l’Image par l’image, Christoph Wiesner, director of
Les Rencontres d’Arles, and Fannie Escoulen, delegate for photography
at the Ministry of Culture, Pascal Beausse, director of collections at
Centre National de la Photographie, art critic and exhibition curator,
Christophe Ono-dit-Biot, writer and deputy editorial director of Le
Point and Maryse Bataillard, head of corporate communications and CSR
at BMW Group France.
This artistic project is a new experiment, the result
of their collaboration, which will result in a new exhibition and will
be shown as part of BMW’s continuing partnership with Les Rencontres
d’Arles and Paris Photo.
The project, The Green Ray
The Green Ray is
about the poetics of light, offering a way of making the invisible
visible to the eye. Mustapha Azeroual records sunlight at sunrise and
sunset, to capture a palette of colours corresponding to the territory
in which he is shooting. The result is a series of abstract images
derived from this optical experiment. For BMW ART MAKERS, Mustapha
Azeroual is interested in shooting the sun on the high seas, a
territory he has never explored before. To keep travel to a minimum,
the duo will be creating a community of sailors, scientists and
artists. Each group will have a precise shooting protocol to
follow. The Green Ray aims to show that a different kind of
abstraction is possible, one that reflects the issues and problems
facing our society, since the colour of the sky fluctuates according
to human activity. An immersive, eco-responsible scenography will be
designed to be reused and adapted to new locations.
Mustapha Azeroual and Marjolaine Lévy said on the announcement of
their nomination: “We are very pleased with this nomination, both
because it’s a project that combines a reflection on narrative
abstraction that we share, and because it’s also an exhibition that is
based on a close collaboration, which is actually quite rare, between
artist and curator, from the writing of the project to its
realisation. Finally, the BMW ART MAKERS program, with its
contemporary environmental and societal issues, seems to us to be the
ideal context in which to bring our project “The Green Ray”
to a successful conclusion, an installation firmly rooted in the
issues of our time and offering a unique immersive experience to the public”.
The BMW ART MAKERS program will make this project
possible.
“The particularity of this programme is
that it brings together an artist and a curator. Our aim is to bring
out the complementary nature of each to give birth to a large-scale
project from the first thought to the final work. Working alongside
the artist, the curator acts as artistic director, scenographer and
consultant, ensuring that the project is carried out to the highest
artistic standards and on schedule”. Maryse Bataillard, Head of
Corporate Communications and CSR, BMW Group France.
Applications and trends identified in this edition of BMW ART
MAKERS.
Each year, the projects received in response
to the call for applications reveal the trends and subjects being
explored by the artists. The five candidate duos were selected from
among 70 applicants who submitted a dossier containing a statement of
intent, a budget, a production schedule, a proposed scenography and
images of their previous work. The projects submitted showed a great
diversity of profiles and work, with 50% of the applicants being mixed
duos, 35% women’s duos and 15% men’s duos. 70% of these duos were
French, 30% international, from more than 25 countries around the
world. A number of major trends emerged, reflecting current societal
issues: a large number of proposals focused on the environment and the
ecological transition, with a view to preserving the planet. Projects
focused on sunlight, water, plants and biological ecosystems. Another
strong trend was migrants, inclusion and invisibility, with a desire
to make minorities visible (disability, mental or physical illness,
gender, ethnic minorities, etc.).
The exhibition’s scenography revealed a strong immersive character,
with the use of new technologies such as video mapping, artificial
intelligence and virtual reality. In keeping with the desire to
immerse visitors, but also to anchor them physically in the real
world, many of the installations offered visitors the chance to take a
break by lying down or immersing themselves in the installation in a
contemplative way.
The first selection of projects was made by a panel of visual arts
professionals including Clara Chalou, artistic committee of the
Festival Circulations, Karin Hemar, designer and strategy consultant,
Fabrice Laroche, professor at Gobelins, l’école de l’Image, Maud
Prangey, head of the Juvernas Prize and Maryse Bataillard, head of
corporate communications and CSR at BMW Group France.
The pre-jury allowed 5 nominated artist-curator duos to be
interviewed by the jury.
– Mounir Ayache (artist),
Anne Bourassé (curator) with the project « Le Mirage de Retz
»
– Laure Winants (artist), Michel Poivert (curator) with
the project « Time Capsule »
– Maxime Riché (artist),
Céline Lerebourg (curator) with the project « Ecotone 1 »
(Murmuratio)
– Alice Pallot (artist), Leonore Chirol
(curator) with the project « Là-haut les algues Bleues »
