Abstract

While cycling in the Pyrenees near the border between France and Spain, I came across three different solar energy collectors located close to each other, aligned from East to West in the chronological order of their construction.
It seems to me that these elegant structures signal a route away from consumer society’s dependency on destructive sources of energy, and so embody the possibility of retrieving a modernity that is coherent, progressive and more sustainable. Yet they have been overshadowed by the overwhelming predominance of the nuclear industry in France and the fossil fuel industry worldwide. With energy depletion and climate damage increasingly threatening the bases of society and culture, the marginalization of a peaceful, non- polluting technology cannot be accounted for in purely rational terms. Of course, political and economic decisions support particular ideological positions. But it is as an artist that I am interested in these solar furnaces and my aim here is to sketch out an idea for a new art work that offers an aesthetic experience as an invitation to consider how scientific reason relates to hidden phobias and unspoken desires.

How to Cite:

Cross, D., (2011) “Bonjour Tristesse: Study for an art project. Cerdagne, France 2010”, field: 4(1), 135–148.