“You can stay half an hour, you will never see the same thing twice”, immerse yourself in the PIXELS exhibition at the Bastille

At the Grand Palais Immersif, Miguel Chevalier, one of the pioneers of digital art, offers the public a sensory experience thanks to interactive installations that evolve with the contact of visitors.

It’s an exhibition to get pixelated. Here, visitors do not contemplate the work but it is the work itself which scrutinizes them. Six screens break down the bodies according to the movements. Behind his artistic creations hide very complex algorithms, very difficult to decipher. “It reminds me of programming we did when I was young. I don’t understand!“, reacts a visitor taken aback.

How to imagine cyberspace? The artist Miguel Chevalier who designed this exhibition, imagines it in his own way through his wired networks which are constantly composed and readjusted. AI, artificial intelligence of course, is at work but then AI is Is she an artist?

Using a text, the artist, the real one, dictates his idea to the AI. Then the machine invents the rest. “We must already imagine what the AI ​​will create upstream. The artist has to think a little first and then he has to reshape what the AI ​​wants to create. So I think yes, it’s a creation”, comments this other visitor.

In a huge room, human and machine dialogue is even more immersive. The image and even the music are generated from the movements of visitors. “We’ll see children who will run and jump in all directions; we can have adults who will simply lie down. That’s what’s interesting because depending on what’s happening around, the work is never the same thing, you can stay half an hour, you will never see the same thing twice”explains Marine Cagniet, Grand Palais Immersif operations manager.

The PIXELS exhibition is poetic and colorful but also raises the question of the place of generative digital art. On view until April 6 at the Grand Palais Immersif, 110 rue de Lyon, Bastille.