Habiter, 2003
This project originated from a commission from the France Culture radio, where I was asked to produce a 30-minute sound creation for the "Ateliers de Création Radiophonique" (Radio Creation Workshops). There was only one rule: the place of the experience had to be in Poissy, at the Villa Savoye designed by Le Corbusier. I then decided to spend several nights in this villa, to which I had access for a whole year.
Each time, I arrived a little before closing time, on Sundays, around 5pm. I met the last visitors, a few retarded Japanese, couples on a walk. The employees recounted their cash register and then left me alone. It always took me a little time to get used to my new residence. I usually didn't sleep well, I left the light on.
Slowly, the white architecture of the villa became my new shell, a mental space, conducive to a reflection on the notion of living/uninhabiting. Then came the photographic images in situ, self-portraits.
I tried to give my body a place. Being alone in a house and controlling my image. Does a tree that falls in a deserted forest make noise? Can a single person in an empty, white house have an image?
I tried to inhabit the villa like a fly, a spider that lives in inaccessible corners. The sleeping bag shows the chrysalis of a possible butterfly. Naked body, insect that frees itself from its gangue.
The photos then enriched the radio project - I showed them to a psychiatrist, an architect, a night watchman at the Louvre, to the students of the Lycée de Poissy; they provoked as many reactions as I recorded.
