The Tales

For Art au Centre, Olivia Hernaïz presents one of the artworks from her trilogy The Tales (2019) in which she explores the significance of the myth of growth on which our Western societies are built. An irreducible flight forward denouncing a human quest for the unattainable, crystallizing in the work through a broken communication. The Cosmonautes, the Cavern and the Angel, installed in the heart of the window, consists of a diorama, a silkscreen print and a sound piece. The spectator is invited to carefully observe the scene that appears in front of him, while listening to the story being told. From an almost divine, outsourced perspective, we focus on a detail, a fragment of a larger enterprise that may well be like our own. The protagonists, « The cosmonauts, the cave and the angel » become the symbols of a myth where times mix and match. Cosmonauts try unsuccessfully to turn the tide of history to prevent disaster. A dead end action, the narration of which, without beginning or end, is diluted by communication that turns out to be out of reach, disturbed, impossible.

The artwork shows the artist’s interest in the deconstruction of collective beliefs as well as the place of dialogue within her work. Whatever the medium, Olivia Hernaïz tackles sometimes thorny questions, notions of talent or collective paternity or even the place of women in the world of art. Her installations use a deliberately childish and innocent aesthetic, a « strategy » of seduction to address overlooked topics such as politics, finance and the capitalist model. Olivia Hernaïz exposes the dead ends of the myths and systems that govern our modern societies, not without humor, she underlines the absurdity.