“Endowed with an encyclopedic culture and devoid of any preconceptions, he never ceased to exercise his curiosity and encourage everyone to observe the world with a new eye.” It is with these words that the publishing house Premier Parallèle, specialized in the human sciences, which published two of the works (Observation exercises – In the footsteps of everyday anthropologists, writers, designers and naturalists, in 2022 and Persistence of the marvelous – The little people of our machinesin 2024) by Nicolas Nova, announced the sudden disappearance of the author and researcher specializing in digital anthropology.
Bassist in a reggae group alongside Régis Maynard in his teens
Born in Roanne in 1977, Nicolas Nova lived with his parents, his brother and his sister in Chandon and had completed part of his schooling in Charlieu, at the Notre-Dame middle school and high school, in the 1990s. When he was a teenager , he was the bassist for the reggae group The Smoothy Monks, alongside actor Régis Maynard. “We were good friends, we spent a lot of time together despite the age gap. Nicolas was someone I really appreciated. Even when he was very young, he had extraordinary intelligence, a natural madness and a caustic sense of humor” , remembers the actor of More beautiful life, even more beautiful. “I was planning to put his latest book on my Santa list, and then I told myself I was going to buy it myself. I’m going to buy it twice…”
Nicolas Nova was blessed with an insatiable curiosity, a pharaonic and very eclectic culture, it was striking.
Over the course of his career, Nicolas Nova had authored around fifteen works. His research focused on understanding digital cultures and their evolution and explored topics such as Internet memes (phenomenon taken up and declined en masse on the Internet, Editor’s note)the use of smartphones, as well as the links between science fiction and technology. “Nicolas Nova had an insatiable curiosity, a pharaonic and very eclectic culture. It was striking,” remembers Amélie Petit, co-founder of Premier Parallèle.
Died while traveling in Oman
A professor at the Geneva High School of Art and Design where he taught ethnography, the history of digital cultures and design research, the forty-year-old was also co-founder of Girardin & Nova en 2024, a multidisciplinary agency which addresses pressing global issues, from the digitalization of cities to the implications of environmental change. He was also a collaborator of the Lift Lab, with Laurent Haug, and sometimes of the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne.
On December 31, 2024, while trekking in Oman, the Franco-Swiss died following a heart attack. “In his element, he traveled, hiked and explored,” it is written on nicolasnova.org, a website opened by those close to Nicolas Nova to share testimonies.
