Abraham Poincheval has joined its platform on Monday, September 26 Mr Deloffre/20Minutes

Among the works in the course of 2016, of White Night, there is, as is customary now, many of the performances. Without that it can explain why, Jean de Loisy, artistic director of the event, agrees : “Even if the program is demanding, it requires that Nuit Blanche remains a spectacular, living, provoke reactions and debates. The performance is a form that fits well with the decor of a drive at night. “

We met five artists programmed by Nuit Blanche, so that they explain their performance :

Abraham Poincheval spent five days at the top of a mast of 20 meters…

Estelle Delesalle installs a workshop for the construction and destruction of hearts in wood…

Pierre Delavie returns and “pierces” the façade of the Conciergerie…

Laurent Tixador along the docks in his mobile home and retractable…

Oliver Beer makes us listen to the sounds underwater of the Seine…

The common point of these five artists ? They have struggled to organize or achieve their performance. At the same time, they have a bit sought. Has there idea of spending five days on a platform of three metres square perched at a height of twenty metres ? For his experience stylites contemporary, already conducted two times ” but less top “, Abraham Poincheval was not too much of a hassle. After all, he had already spent a week in a hole in the city centre of Tours, and fifteen days in a bear stuffed in the Museum of hunting and nature in Paris. “The logistical aspect is a bit always the same. People always ask me how I do for my waste, let’s say, organic. it always ask people. Let’s say that I organize. Me carting the concrete aspects of the experience, it allows me to go beyond the concept. But I do not know in advance what I’m going to live, that’s why I do it. “

chainsaws in Paris

Estelle Delesalle, she invited four loggers champions of France to charge all night thirty trees to make small hearts in the wood.

For Nuit Blanche, 2016, Estelle Delesalle and  Jean-Marc Ferrari installs a factory of  cœurs of the wood in Paris
For Nuit Blanche, 2016, Estelle Delesalle and Jean-Marc Ferrari installs a factory producing hearts of wood in Paris – Estelle Delesalle/Jean-Marc Ferrari

” there are security issues quite complex, of course. It brings when the same axes and chainsaws… ” The british artist Oliver Beer has also had little trouble with the forces of law and order. Its installation on the pont des Arts proposes to capture and return with the speakers the sounds underwater of the Seine.

Oliver Beer installs his work
Oliver Beer installs his work – the Oliver Beer

” I came to do some testing to see at what depth it was necessary to submerge the microphones get sounds interesting. But barely thirty seconds after it began, police came to ask me what I was making. You can have confidence in your police ! They will not leave never a English weird to do anything in the river Seine. “

The Conciergerie of Paris will be upside down  grâce à
The Concierge in Paris will be in shambles thanks to Pierre Delavie

Pierre Delavie, for its part, has put in the head to cover the facade on the Seine of the Concierge with a covering of 1.200 m2. “I make creations in situ, so it is always a bit new. My works are not transferable to other locations. But of course, I improve myself from a technical point of view, I know better the distance of the gaze, for example. “The real challenge of his work is to create the illusion. The passing will feel crazy to see the inside of the building returned, with the top of the vaults of the medieval flooded… But in the end, the technical aspect is not what causes the most concern to the artist. “I know that I can not much but I would like that are not used too the term” trompe l’oeil ” to talk about my work, I find that it is an antiquated concept and easy, I prefer the phrase “lying urban”. I claim the lie. “

human contact

Laurent Tixador is a regular performance with strong constraints. He regularly try to rally point a to point B, to be naked is in a straight line or armed with only a compass. For Nuit Blanche, he has invented a mobile home and retractable… Complicated to create and then to use, her house will provide a shelter to spend several nights on the quays of paris where he is not afraid of the bad people. “This is not the Bronx either. But it is true that I usually works rather hidden. There, people are going to come and see us, we will be in contact with different populations. “

finally It is the other common point of these five artists of Nuit Blanche. All are eager to share with passers-by and gauge their reaction. “If someone passes by, sees me and asks why I’m perched like that to twenty meters high, my contract is fulfilled,” explains Abraham Poincheval. Pierre Delavie hope that with its implementation, “people think a little about what surrounds them, it is little and it is all at once.” no matter the energy expended, Estelle Delesalle and Oliver Beer want to create a moment out of time. Either by discovering the richness of the underwater world, or taking the time to reflect on what it means to the feeling of love.

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