“He’s one of the first artists I thought of when I defined the theme of the Biennale,” the curator of the 18th edition of Momenta, Ji-Yoon Han, tells us in a telephone interview.
“The question of identity is at the heart of the theme of metamorphosis, but what interests me is not identity in the sense of being, but of becoming. The in-between, between oneself and the other, the visible and the invisible, the human and the non-human, and really looking for this interval, this slightly blurry zone… Séamus succeeds in doing exactly that . »
To mark the occasion, the chemical company DuPont had set up a small podium in its pavilion at the New York World’s Fair, just before the start of World War II, where a model called Miss Chemistry paraded. DuPont touted its synthetic silk stockings made with coal, air and water.
You can also see a short promotional video of this event in a corner of the room dedicated to the exhibition. We learn that despite the success of nylon stockings, DuPont factories had to suspend production to make military parachutes, ropes and tents in order to support the American war effort.
In short, upon entering the large room of the McCord Stewart museum, you can see a reproduction of the dress worn by the model hired by DuPont, Gallagher version, before strolling in front of five lenticular photographs – photos with two images in one, which change depending on our movements. Think about the surprise photos that were in the cereal boxes!
“Séamus plays between the virtual world and the real world,” Ji-Yoon tells us. He creates scenes from odds and ends, with paper sets, and he explores the idea of imperfect mimicry where things are never quite well done, where there is a cheap and kitsch side which is entirely assumed. . »
A small installation dominates the room. We see a virtual incarnation of Miss Chemistry in drag, but, thanks to 3D mapping, it is the face of Séamus Gallagher which rests on the body of the model and who shares his feelings about the end of the chemical dream of 1939 – threatened today by the environmental crisis – and on the world of tomorrow.
“The world of tomorrow” was in fact the theme of the 1939 Universal Exhibition. What remains of the promises of that world? The artist asks the question, while focusing on the words “Mother”, “Memory” and “Cellophane” – which we find in the title of the exhibition – which found themselves at the top of the list of the most beautiful words of the English language in a survey carried out in 1940.
In short, metamorphoses rain down in this exhibition-installation, which completely revisits the representation that we could have of this Miss Chemistry, whose ghost prowls the McCord Stewart museum. A great way to kick off the Biennale.