At the foot of the Champs-Élysées, the Charles-Aznavour garden now hosts a Salon. Six bronze chairs, representing the six continents, are arranged in a circle under the gaze of the centerpiece of the work: a black woman holding an olive branch and a golden flame in her hands. Two symbols of peace and victory which make this work, created by Californian artist Alison Saar, the official sculpture of the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games, inaugurated on Sunday June 23.
« Salon is an invitation to dialogue, to exchange, to meeting, to sharing”, greeted Thomas Bach, president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), during the inauguration of the work in the Charles-Aznavour garden, in Paris. It celebrates, according to him, “the unity of all humanity in its diversity”. He sees in it the reason for the Olympic Games: “Bringing together the different cultures of the world in peaceful competition and dialogue. »
Support for French crafts
In total, 20 artists were approached by the IOC, the city of Paris and the Games Organizing Committee to create the official work for this edition. Ultimately, the choice fell on the Californian artist Alison Saar. In a press release, the city of Paris explained that it appreciated its desire “to support French craftsmanship and reduce its carbon footprint”. Indeed, the sculptural ensemble was created by the artist in French workshops in Puy-de-Dôme, using natural and recovered materials.
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Born in 1956 in Los Angeles, Alison Saar grew up in a family of artists. While his father, Richard Saar, works with ceramics and restores works of art, his mother, Betye Saar, offers assemblages relating to identity and discrimination experienced by African-Americans. These themes will influence the artist’s own journey. For forty years, she has also worked on issues of gender, race and heritage. “I am mixed race myself, so the majority of my work focuses on my African ancestry”she briefly indicated during the inauguration of her sculpture on Sunday in Paris.
The passing of the cultural torch
Although she remains little known in France today, Alison Saar has a great reputation in the United States, where over the years she has become one of the leading figures in the artistic movement dealing with black female identity. In 2008, she signed the first monument paying tribute to a black woman in New York City. This sculpture represents the figure of the former slave Harriet Tubman and ranks among the greatest works created by the artist. Since then, she has regularly exhibited her work in the New York museums of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MoMA) and the Whitney Museum.
Paris 2024: sporting heritage, a land of discovery
With his Salonthe artist therefore succeeds the Frenchman and visual artist Xavier Veilhan, who had been selected thanks to his set of sculptures The Audience for the Tokyo 2021 Olympic Games. This year too, the choice of an American artist is not insignificant. It is part of the next Olympic Games, organized in Los Angeles in 2028. “The objective is to forge links between the host citiesexplains the city of Paris in its press release. These symbolically pass the cultural torch of the legacy of the Olympic and Paralympic Games through the creations of visual artists. »
