The new exhibition at Hangar Y offers a luminous and sensitive journey through the works of modern and contemporary artists and scientific and vernacular images.
Our sun is so familiar and everyday that we sometimes forget it. Moreover, it is no longer just its light that punctuates and invades our lives, as certain artists point out, but rather the electric light of lamps and screens. Falsely associated with global warming, the Sun is sometimes unloved and feared. Its heat reminds us of the sublime mystery of its burning consistency. The sun's burns, its blows, its traces and its effects activate the imagination of artists, just like its ambivalences, without which life on Earth would not exist: the sun heats but sets on fire; it illuminates while dazzling…
This contradiction inherent in this star recalls the famous maxim of François de La Rochefoucauld: “The sun nor death can stare fixedly”. The abstract and vibrant photographs of a whole young generation of photographers, fascinated by the effect of the sun's rays on sensitive surfaces, “draw” with the star and reconnect with the experiments of the inventors of photography and cinema. A sensitive exploration of the sun through the eyes of artists. It is with humor that some artists seize the motif of the sunset which they divert while others observe with delight the sublime moment of eternity when the moon “rises” and the sun disappears. Night falls slowly, and the darkness grows. Plunged into darkness, the sun is still there, but not exactly here. At the origin of numerous cults, the divine and mystical power of the Sun is a rich source of inspiration for artists who question our need for transcendence.