Diving boy, Jumped off.

 

Diving Boy, completed background, beginning of announcement, 2014

International Association of Social Leisure Developement (IASLD)

Here then is a young man, no professional diver, but quite expert because he has lived by the sea, this amateur travels the seas, the steep coasts, then goes to a big city, wanting to become a real diver. He frequents more and more swimming pools, places where diving boards are installed. But they are still just swimming pools and, very soon, he gets tired of them. Searching new sites, he found a large building standing near an outdoor swimming pool. Imagine being able to dive from the top of this building into this pool located right below. He writes a letter to the residents of this building. One of them answers him, a member of an association dedicated to events, IASLD (International Association Of Social Leisure Development), whose premises occupy some floors of this building. The association recalls a similar event, which it had organised some time before: a Badminton match on the roof terrace of a building, without parapet or railing. Therefore, for safety reasons, no spectators had been able to attend this match.

This time, after consulting the pool staff, calculating the depth of the pool, the diving angle and checking the clauses of the insurance contracts, the association decided to organise a spectacular event centered on this dive. The young man accepts and signs the contract offered to him. Together with the IASLD they decide on a date and prepare an official announcement. The owners of the buildings adjacent to the pool are contacted to make spaces available for spectators. Everyone gives their permission. The advertising goes online, appears in newspapers and then the viewer registration forms start arriving. To avoid repeating the failure of the past, the association offers multiple options to viewers. Since the event was very unifying, the newspapers published photographs of the very moment in which the young man jumped from the trampoline. This young man became a famous professional diver, perhaps thanks to these spectators, the phantom mass, which he had not really seen while he concentrated on diving.

Hyperspectacles in hypermodern society

With the series of LEISURE, the group IASLD speaks of hypermodern society where we live in.  

In this hypermodern society, individuals no longer work towards achieving the common interest. They believe that they can form themselves according to their own taste, by choosing their education and geographical location, etc. This continuity of choice makes them delude themselves about the possibility of total freedom in the name of the neo-nomadism. Ironically, this autonomy obeys and submits to capitalist rule. In other words, they are voluntarily autonomous in relation to the choices given, the majority of which will be involuntarily linked to economic interest.

At the heart of the capitalist and democratic regime which are both coexisting and contradictory, a pursuit of personalized happiness of hedonistic, libertarian individuals create a double contradiction on what we define as ‘freedom’. That of hypermodernity presupposes consumption to have freedom in the pursuit of happiness, while the ideology of democracy implies total freedom of one’s own decisions.

In an interactive way, the series of paintings ‘Leisure’ shows the way in which individuals spend their ‘free’ time. Delicately designed devices such as spectacular events are used to pose questionable questions about controlled freedom in the abundance of choice. They appear to the public with media devices to encourage spectator participation. Its slogan, called ‘unification’ of the world, could translate into a large market which brings together consumers; this is transformed, in a sense, into the democratic principle of ‘egalitarian cultural sharing’.

Carring out a promotional presentation, offering a description of the event and its background, with the aim of bringing together a « phantom mass » of Internet participants  in various categories in fictitious milieux – such as the sport business, shopping, tourisme and catering. The series attempts a parodic representation of real phenomena, hyperspectacles in our hypermodern society.

La « masse invisible » évoluant au sein de la virtualité, constituée d’individus hypermodernes, suscitée par les médias gravitant autour du « spectacle hypermoderne », représente le sujet principal qui a déclenché ce projet. Ces trois constituants, que sont les individus, le spectacle et le lieu, nous avons recherché le concept d’origine de ce qui forme la « masse » de par le passé, pour ensuite orienter notre développement vers les formes de collectivités actuelles constituées par nos contemporains.

 

 

Masses hypermodernes d’individus

Ce questionnement a débuté avec une série dénommée « Leisure », présentant une approche des « temps de loisir » des individus qui obéissent à certains mécanismes sociaux. En 2014, toujours pour ce même thème mais en me focalisant sur le phénomène de la grégarité, la collectivité dans la culture de masse, un projet interactif, « Diving Boy  », cinquième volet de cette série « Leisure » a été réalisé. Autour du personnage principal représenté sur l’arrière-plan scénique, il accueille des participants à un évènement fictif qui se déroulerait uniquement sur cette toile, la création de ce « pseudo-évènement, qui réellement n’existe pas », illustrant le concept principal de cette série.

Le communiqué de « Diving Boy » annonce le projet d’un jeune homme souhaitant effectuer un « plongeon » sur des bâtiments équipés d’un écran d’un format considérable. L’entreprise à laquelle il a demandé d’organiser cet évènement présente une lettre en ligne. Pour y participer, plusieurs choix sont proposés aux spectateurs concernant leur place, leurs actions, leur habillement, etc., les « inscriptions » étant faites en ligne.