Sculpture. Steel structure, sliced concrete volumes, copper, glass, skulls of wild animals (deer, wild boar, badgers, marten), animal hair, snail shell. 200 x 191 cm x 176 cm (h).
Production assistance: La Lune en Parachute, La Région Grand Est, Honoré SAS.
A “wall” of steel and concrete stands in front of the public and blocks the passage. It includes a few steps equipped with guardrails allowing you to climb up to look to the other side, like the platforms from which West Berliners could once see the other part of the city. But the position also makes possible a bird’s eye view of the upper part of this “wall” itself. This is topped with broken glass: a common anti-crossing system, which here shines with seductive luminous and colorful bursts. The upper concrete part is sliced vertically into numerous elements of varying thickness which are arranged with more or less spacing over the two meters, giving an openwork, even frayed, or in any case weakened, appearance from the top of the “wall” . By observing the cut surfaces of these “wall slices”, we can discover astonishing patterns. Symmetrical and organic in appearance, they appear to come from volumes taken from the concrete, whose invisible existence seemed until then sealed in the mass. This is when perception shifts. The spectator is no longer facing the wall, but on an observation post from which he contemplates the "geological" history of this construction like an archaeologist: the interior of the "dissected wall" in fact reveals, among some cables in copper, animal hair and bones. These are precisely several skulls of deer, wild boar, badgers and a marten, which, when cut, produce the patterns.
Indeed, borders and their walls have been built on cemeteries through struggles for territories since the dawn of time. Mauerblick can also be considered an invitation to think beyond the face-to-face encounters which can monopolize attention through a feeling of enmity towards the other, while the figure of the enemy is a construction just as much that a wall is one.
Mauerblick(2023)
