the new Didam exhibition highlights the “Talents of the Basque Country”

For Yves Ugalde, cultural assistant for the City of Bayonne, this exhibition is part of the season's dynamic of promoting high-quality local artists, while opening up to internationally renowned figures like Plantu next summer. .

Portraits and dance scenes

In the room to the right of the triptych, the colorful canvases of the artist Miguel Etxebarria highlight Basque culture and history. Representations of hoop dancing or sword dancing intertwine with paintings depicting the Spanish Civil War. One painting refers in particular to the exodus faced with the arrival of Francoism, of which his family was the victim.

A series of portraits was specially created for the exhibition. The facial expressions are designed to give free rein to interpretations. “It’s funny because each person has a different appreciation,” laughs the painter.

Unable to obscure his love for bullfighting, a pelea scene, a bull fight, sits in the center to recall the bullfighting traditions of the Basque Country.

The bathers

For her part, Martine Pinsolle sublimates the bodies of bathers, dressed in a swimsuit or completely naked. The one who, through her paintings “does not want to tell stories”, strives instead to reflect our experience of intimacy and space. “I focus on lines, curves and attitudes in still moments. This is why I work on female bodies. »

By contemplating the different works, visitors will be able to notice the evolution of the artist's brushwork over time. “The more I advance in my work, the more sober my style becomes. I think the ambition of every artist is to get to the essential. »

The soft light, particular to the Basque Country according to her, illuminates the bodies under a neutral and refined backdrop. These women, almost all dressed in white swimsuits, are a nod to the bathers of Biarritz during the art deco era.

Luminous Chimera

The photographer Mathieu Prat occupies the back of the main room to present a series of scenes of a luminous chimera in the heights of the Pyrenees, where he loved to contemplate the sky during his young summer nights. These photographs, taken from an “adult's thought based on a childhood memory”, address the theme of light pollution in the face of the starry picture of the sky, so rare to contemplate these days.

The series retraces the journey of a chimera, made by the artist and presented at the exhibition, through black and white and color photos. His adventure ends under an arm of the Milky Way. “It’s here that the chimera died out and vanished,” says the photographer.