Julian Charrière – Towards No Earthly Pole, 2019 - Not All Who Wander Are Lost, 2019 - Pure Waste, 2021

Julian Charrière‘s practice bridges the fields of art and science and explores the relationship between humans and their environment, which the current climate crisis has turned upside down. In this installation combining video, sculpture and sounds, Julian Charrière reproduces the disorientating feeling that humans experience when they behold the immensity of glacial landscapes. In Pure Waste, Charrière reverses the traditional cycle of humans exploiting natural resources, by returning to the Earth five diamonds that he made from CO2 harvested from ambient air and exhalations, among others, in collaboration with the ETH Zurich technology institute. In Towards No Earthly Pole, the artist plays on the gap between our collective perception of glacial landscapes and the fragile reality of the cryospheres, imperilled by global warming. Lastly, the erratic boulder of Not All Who Wander Are Lost – perforated and placed on its own core samples and inserted metal elements – reminds us of the history of glaciers, spanning millennialong resistance and gradual disappearance. The multimedia installation proposes a poetic and intimate interpretation of these worlds, which are usually approached with scientific objectivity.

Also on view at Musée Fourvière and URDLA.