Mécanique d’un mur

The window space is much more than a simple interface between the interior of a store and the outside world. It is a silent theater where objects come to life without ever leaving their place. The window is the art of showing without touching, of revealing without unveiling, creating a particular tension between the real and the projection of the real. It is a theatrical stage where the outlines of our daily lives take shape and where mechanisms activate before our eyes.

This installation titled Mécanique d’un mur involves building a wall made of cardboard with the same dimensions as concrete blocks and erecting it using mechanical grease. Installed from floor to ceiling, it faces the viewer, offering a view from the street of a construction resembling the foundations of the building above it. Over the course of the exhibition, the grease infiltrates the fibers of the cardboard and reveals the usual effects of mortar on the stability of a construction.

This installation also evokes the principle of bricking up; an act that seals the opening of a door or window and reinforces the metaphor of the desertification that currently affects the city of Liège. In this changing environment, where commercial spaces transform into cold lifeless walls, the installation becomes a testimony to the ongoing urban transformation.

This “production” reveals the generally invisible backstage of our daily environment. Passersby are invited to contemplate the very essence of a construction and the complex mechanisms that underlie it, and to consider their living space in a new way by appreciating the silent drama that unfolds around them every day.