CLOUDS | NUAGES

Clouds | Nuages is the subject of a solo exhibition in La Maréchalerie contemporary arts centre and the Galerie des Moulages of the Louvre museum in Versailles.

Clouds is a development of a previous body of work, OrtaWater (2005) and the result of a field trip to Egypt (2009), and more specifically a site visit to Moqattam, the Zabbaleen neighbourhoods of Cairo.

The work explores the relationship between a lack of water in the world, the privatisation of the resource represented by plastic bottle bundles, and the parallel economy of people surviving on waste. The community of Zabbaleen collect and recycle the city’s garbage notably huge bundles of plastic bottles and these organic formations inspired the sculpting process of the project. The manipulation of plastic bottles as a medium generates an infinite variety of spatial constructions. The research included experimenting with methods to bind the bottles, smooth off crevices and stabilize the organic formation using papier-mâché. Metaphoric objects were integrated into the nebulous formations and coated with a resin to create a durable shell to protect the fragile assemblages. The cloud formations are hand finished painted with metallic layers of paint to create iridescent effects.

The body of work Clouds | Nuages was co-commissioned by Ecole nationale supérieure d’architecture de Versailles (Ensa-V) and La Maréchalerie contemporary arts centre.

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