Inspired by ancient climates, the French photographer and visual artist’s work questions our relationship with the environment.
Noemi Goodall is on all fronts this summer. At the same time, he performs a solo show, Phoenix, at the Rencontres de la Photographie d’Arles of the Church of the Trinitaires (not counting his two works in a collective exhibition the song of heaven in Monoprix) and participates Event horizon At the Chateau de Sèvres (2). In both cases, he presents his latest work.
Behind the Scenes of the 6th Madame Figaro Photography Prize Jury Visits – Arles
Born in 1984, the artist, who graduated from the Royal College of Art in London, is interested deep time (the geological history of the planet) and paleoclimatology (the study of past climates). Her approach is based on photography, performance and video. Under the dim light of Trinity Church, the journey begins with five very seductive large-format color images. Noemi Goodall photographed a palm grove, incorporated printed images she had just taken, before re-photographing the location, creating a work of perception bordering on hallucinatory.
Behind the Scenes of the 6th Madame Figaro Photography Prize Jury Visits – Arles
fire against ice
More disturbing in their reflections are the two hypnotic films shown in the nave of the church. In Down from the deep south (2020), tropical scenes move slowly before catching fire, like an optical illusion. “As the decor crackles and burns to reveal another layer, the work questions the possibility of renewal offered by fire while recalling its destructive qualities,” comments curator Alona Pardo.
The other movie Breathe, exhale (2021) uses the Bering Strait arctic environment as a conceptual surface. Landscape decorations featuring banana trees and other plant species rise and fall into the water, raising the question of sea level 0.
To explore this interplay between human and non-human and to support his philosophy that the Earth is a living organism with its own temporal logic, Noemi Goodall and director Clemence Poesy also presented at the Avignon Festival in July; In the listed courtyard of the Lambert Collection, Anima, an almost entirely digital installation-performance in which the soft images of trees projected on three large cinema screens change imperceptibly before the all-consuming fire. Noemi Goodall signs a manifesto against the end of the world.
Behind the Scenes of the 6th Madame Figaro Photography Prize Jury Visits – Arles
(1) phoenixAt Trinity Church, until August 28, 2022
(2) Event horizonAt Château d’Oiron, until October 2, 2022
Read : Naomi Goodall, text by Guillaume Logé, Percevoir Collection, La Martinière Editions. Reflections on images by a visual artist photographer that leave room for multiple interpretations as much as they question the fragility of our presence on Earth.
Source: Le Figaro
