Juan Le Parc
MEAT TEMPLE / TRAGEDIA ZOOPHILICA, 2015
VR experience for HTC Vive
The Meat Temple is an immersive virtual universe in which visitors explore an ancient temple built with meat and meat products (ham, salami, mortadella, chorizo...). The cow and the pig, two symptomatic and symbolic breeding animals, have been chosen to represent religious and moral food taboos in this. They are staged in a slow, macabre and mechanical choreography, on the verge of agony and cannibal carnage. We hear screaming the automaton clock of churches in unison with that of automatic slaughterhouses, which announces the time of production to the chain of industrial suffering. In the second part of this memory architecture appear some human animals are old and swollen by obesity, others are younger, deformed by rickets. All suffer from malnutrition and their bodies revolt against this injustice by fomenting the wars of hunger and satiety. Inside their body of animals appears a chopped steak homunculus that fights against the programmed obsolescence of the human body. In the middle of the temple, the bargaining table, of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, is set for a carnivorous and cannibal feast. Here it plays the last act of this animal tragedy.
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VIDEO LINK
ABOUT THE ARTIST
When I returned, I began to make creative connections between art, science and technology. The starting point of my research is the contemporary human body and the study of its transformations, mutations, hybridizations of biological, genetic, cultural or political character.
In the early eighties, I was part of the first generation of artists who had access to personal computers utilising them as creative tools. The challenge was to invent new multimedia languages. I was particularly interested in 3D creation tools, modeling, digital sculpture and interactive simulations. Subsequently, I realized several projects, such as "Shoot the icon", "Raw Memory", "Meat Temple". Thanks to these different experiences, in 2016, I quickly decided to acquire a virtual reality headset and start creating immersive worlds with multiple possibilities.
These virtual worlds, essentially dematerialized, encourage us to change our view of the things of art. We move from a register where the work of art is considered an object, to the one where it is considered an immersive experience. The role of the artist would be to create and exchange only material objects, but also to propose and exchange intense sensory experiences.It is interesting to note that it is the same tools that are used to create and present the work.
At first I create my sculptures, my environments, my music with VR headphones and controllers. My body is physically engaged in the creative process. I am at the center of the artistic plot. I jump, I run, I dance and in a few minutes, I'm sweaty like a sculptor facing his block of marble or a painter facing his huge canvas.Then the presentation is viewed on the same device. It allows the user to apprehend another level of reality, time and space. It allows us to reflect on a plural vision of realities.
The brain tends to validate this new reality that is offered to us.
If you are interested in exhibiting or viewing this artistic VR experience, please send an email to us.
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