Pixels Noir Lumière 2019 by Miguel Chevalier

Pixels Noir Lumière, Miguel Chevalier’s solo exhibition at the Soulages Museum, pays tribute to the work of the painter artist Pierre Soulages, who will celebrate his 100th birthday on 24 December 2019. Miguel Chevalier has been developing an artistic approach since the early 1980s, with computer technology as the main medium.

In a constant dialogue with painting and light, he explores and experiments a new pictorial language where the pixel becomes the equivalent of the pictorial touch. The exhibition presents two generative and interactive digital installations, “Pixels Liquides” and “L’Origine du Monde”, which explore light as an artistic material. “Pixels Liquides” is an interactive installation projected on the wall (13.40 m x 7.80 m) like a large moving painting.

Flows of virtual paintings of different shades of black and blue flow on the wall that has become canvas, creating large abstract paintings in real time. The virtual web is constantly changing. It reveals a light painting with surprising material effects. The movement of the spectators disrupts the work. It is a form of “electronic dripping”, where the spectator, like a digital brush, imposes his own gestures and modifies the work in its development.

“L’Origine du Monde” is an interactive installation projected on the ground (12 m x 7.50 m) inspired by biology, microorganisms and cellular automata. The installation presents different black and white virtual paintings composed of universes of cells that proliferate, divide, merge in a rhythm sometimes slow, sometimes fast. This organic world sometimes mixes with unstable mega pixels of black and white.

Photo © Nicolas Gaudelet
Photo © Nicolas Gaudelet
Photo © Nicolas Gaudelet

The artist blends the cells, the basic elements of life with the pixels, the basic elements of artificial “life”. These fluid universes react visually according to the movements of visitors. Disruptions in the trajectory of these cells are created under their feet. “L’Origine du Monde” creates new visual experiences thanks to the superposition of different layers of images. The floating shapes create impressive optical illusions.

These two immersive installations are above all living experiences that engage the visitor’s body and their mobility in space. The relationship to the image is built in the register of displacement to explore all the potentialities of the work, just as for Pierre Soulages’ “Outrenoirs” to capture the variations of light on the paintings. Source by Miguel Chevalier.