Ataraxie

Ataraxie means ‘peace of mind’. In this new installation from Maxime Houot the artist asks us to question what this might mean in a changed and still changing post-pandemic world. A row of lasers fills the space with beams of red light that first form simple crosses, before building up complex, tesseract-like structures. Ataraxie investigates the void of the unknown and asks us whether we might fill it with the comforting and familiar, or find fresh ways to live.

Maxime Houot
Since 2013, Maxime Houot has created numerous sound and visual pieces presented on the international scene. Exploring the limits of his own perception, he deploys a practice that is both artisanal and conceptual. Artisanal since the gesture, the manufacturing, the obsessive accumulation of simple shapes are the bases of his work. His questioning begins in the workshop, by making the device that will support his next creation. Even if the term “Digital Artist” can be used, contact with matter, machines, objects, is fundamental in his work. And this artisanal gesture serves as the starting point for a conceptual approach. Graduated in applied physics, the world around him, even put into an equation, has always been a source of fascination and wonder. The time that does not flow, relative reality, void digitization, and man as a digital machine are concepts that accompany him and feed his imagination. Most of his creations are produced by the company Collectif Coin. Company with which he also likes to experiment by crossing his work with other artists.

Collectif Coin
An artlab based in Grenoble (France), Collectif Coin is dedicated to producing both monumental and intimate installations and performances. Resolutely transdisciplinary and rooted in the digital arts, Collectif Coin mainly manipulates light, sound and the body.