Fauna, Flora and Geometrical Shapes in Benin

Faune Urbaine: Talk

There is an interdisciplinary panel on urban fauna organized by Université Québec à Montréal, Coeur des Sciences and the French Consulate this Thursday November 21st at 6:30pm.

À Qui la Ville? brings together Luc-Alain Giraldeau, an ethnobiologist and dean of science at UQAM, Jacques Dancosse, a veterinarian at Montréal's biodôme, Josée Duplessis, a city politician, Anne-Caroline Prévot-Juilliard from the Muséum d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris (she has worked on the municipal dovecotes in the city) and myself.

It will be an informal conversation on the relation between the various animals (including humans) of the city. What are their physiological needs? What ethical, sanitary and cultural questions does the co-habitation pose? What other environmental urban initiatives have been done around the world? Could any be applied to Montreal?

It should be really interesting!

Animal Estates in Port of Rotterdam Authority

The Port of Rotterdam Authority commissioned Fritz Haeg to produce some of his Animal Estates (most famously presented at the Whitney Museum Biennal in 2008). This short documentary about the port's fauna and flora accompanies the works.

The video is slow and grey and the Dutch sounds unenthusiastic, but this aesthetic emphasizes the industrial landscape's uneasy identity. Like Haeg's work, the short is a reflection about the relation animals and humans have with each other. At first some facts feel more humorous, such as the swans inhabiting the Port dangerously activating the container porter machinery or drunk thrushes in bushes, while others feel darker, like the decrease of Skylarks and their singing -- by 95% in the past decade in the Netherlands, -- or the arrival of fast reproducing rabbit colonies in the oil tanks' meadows (for more on the tragic rabbit-human relation check out myxomatosis)). But overall, all demonstrate how intertwined they are in the larger systems humans engineer.

In any case it seems like a great initiative!

ANIMAL ESTATES 9.0 van Fritz Haeg from DWARSBOOM STUDIO on Vimeo.

London Urban Space (so many hats)

Birds Everywhere

Projekt No.1, 1969. Cover art by Hubert Hilscher (from Pattern and Shape)

Dirt is Matter Out of Place: Thanks all d'être venus!

Taking Photographs in Museums (a published thesis)

In 2010 le Musée d'Orsay in Paris banned photography-taking by visitors. Targeted at visitors, French intellectuals seemed to be the most affected by this new regulation: what about the museum's mission? Didn't the collections belong to all of us? Was this to increase postcard revenues? Outraged academic blogs were uploaded, photographing mobs entered the Musée in protest and articles nervously written, but the ban is still in place and visitors continue to stretch their arms in front of Monets to photograph lily pads. Museum visits, like any 'special' event (see below the image of St Peter's Square during the Pope's election), have become fascinating instances to observe how living the experience is increasingly cohabiting with its own mediation. 

La Documentation française's recent publication Les visiteurs photographes au musée ponders about this evolution from a legal as well as anthropological and technological perspective. The "problem" isn't new. Wanting to reproduce special artifacts (like art works) is decades old (think cave-paintings and hunted animals, Roman sculptures and emperors, royal painters and kings, daguerreotypes and dead children), but till quite recently this was mostly reserved to elites and limited in production. Today, as cameras become smaller, better at capturing light in dim spaces and drastically cheaper, photography-making is a practice available to practically anyone above the age of four with a smartphone-owning parent. In the book, the editors Serge Chaumier, Ann Krebs and Mélanie Roustan brought together a multi-disciplinary bunch of researchers to think about questions like: what are the laws in place to restrict museum photographers? What are these regulations' foundations? What are the strategies museums engage in to encourage or use this growing practice? And obviously why are visitors taking photographs in the first place? 

Back in 2008 I wrote my Masters thesis about why people take photographs of the Rosetta Stone in the British Museum (this has become a chapter in their book). The iphone was a few months old back then, and things have changed a whole lot since, but overall the roots of why we archive visually have not radically shifted. Through photographs we reassure ourselves that we wouldn't forget, we commodify objects or situations that may feel overwhelming, we curate ourselves for others, we gather evocative material to socialize with others, etc. What evolutions in technology have, in fact, done is affected the experience of the now, and hence the museum experience itself... What the book makes clear is that what is at stake here is finding a way to insure that the museum's mission is fulfilled with the museum's reality taken into account.

[In a similar vein I came across this video recently. It makes a good case for street fashion photography's arguable existential crisis: too many street photographers taking too many street photographs is killing the authenticity of the genre, and of the street, and of the fashion, and of the street fashion, and of all its players... argh, existential angst, where has authenticity gone?]

TAKE MY PICTURE from GARAGE Magazine on Vimeo.

"Dirt is Matter Out of Place": A walk, installation and panel in Montréal

For those of you who know about my pigeon obsession, the beast has morphed into an installation, a walk and a panel for the anti-curatorial exhibit Springtemps at the gallery Articule in Montreal from March 29th to April 14th.

The difference between a pigeon and a dove is arbitrary because there is none: the dove is simply a white pigeon. So while we can observe these birds under viaducts we can find them as symbols of the holy spirit in churches as well.

Inspired by the work of anthropologist Mary Douglas, "Dirt is Matter Out of Place" is an installation in the gallery Articule as well as a walk and a panel. The project explores how these birds, once war heroes, illustrate our ambiguous relation to dirt, prejudice and aesthetics, and hopes to imagine solutions to better share Montreal with its fauna.

Join us on April 7th for a pigeon-walk in the Mile End led by biologist Luc-Alain Giraldeau followed by a panel discussion in the gallery with Luc-Alain Giraldeau, Laurent Lussier, urbanist, François Messier, pigeon-breeder, and myself, Chloé Roubert, anthropologist.

1:30 pm at Parc du Portugal on St Laurent and Marianne to begin the walk.
3 pm release of pigeons at Articule
3:15 pm panel at Articule

Articule
262 Fairmount W.
Montréal Québec
H2V 2G3 Canada
(opened tues to thurs 12h–18h, fri 12h-21h, and sat–sun 12h–17h)

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Pour ceux qui connaissent mon intérêt pour les pigeons, l'obsession s'est transformée en une installation, une marche et une table-ronde pour l'exposition anti-curatoriale Springtemps de la galerie Articule à Montréal du 29 mars au 14 avril.

La différence entre un pigeon et une colombe est arbitraire puisqu’elle n’existe pas: la colombe est simplement un pigeon blanc. Si on peut observer ces oiseaux sous les viaducs, on les retrouve aussi comme symbole du Saint-Esprit dans les églises catholiques.

Inspiré par le travail de l'anthropologue Mary Douglas, "Dirt is Matter Out of Place" est une installation dans la galerie Articule ainsi qu'une marche et une table ronde. Au travers de ces oiseaux, anciens héros de guerre, le projet explore notre relation ambiguë à la saleté, empreinte de préjugés; et propose d'imaginer des solutions pour mieux partager Montreal avec sa faune.

Retrouvez-nous le 7 avril pour une marche-pigeon guidée par le biologiste Luc-Alain Giraldeau suivie d’une table ronde avec Luc-Alain Giraldeau, Laurent Lussier, urbaniste, François Messier, éleveur de pigeon et moi-même, Chloé Roubert, anthropologue.

13h30 Parc du Portugal sur St Laurent et Marianne pour le début de la marche.
15h lâcher de pigeons à Articule (262 Fairmount O.)
15h15 table-ronde à Articule

Articule
262 Fairmount O.
Montréal Québec
H2V 2G3 Canada
(ouvert mardi au jeudi 12h–18h, ven 12h-21h, and sam–dim 12h–17h)

(poster Chris Tucker; photo Layne Gardner, for more on the pigeon go to http://www.npausa.com)

The colour of the past

Toutes proviennent de paris1914 où on retrouve des photographies couleurs du début du 20ème de Paris et ses environs. [Remarquons les chevaux sur les quais de Seine.]

Quai de Seine, Paris, Sans date

Jardin des Invalides, VII° Arrondissement Paris, 1909

Le départ du dirigeable Zodiac III, Bétheny, 28 Août 1909

Amulets at the Pitt Rivers

An amulet is "anything worn about the person as a charm or preventative against evil, mischief, disease, witchcraft, etc" (Oxford English Dictionary). For more of the 5000 amulets the Pitt Rivers Museum has archived go to the website Small Blessings.