Chagall

After welcoming over 513,000 visitors for Michelangelo, Leonardo de Vinci, Raphael: The Giants of the Renaissance which closed its doors on the 3 January last, les Carrières de Lumières in Baux-de-Provence continue their innovative and ambitious artistic project with a unique multimedia exhibition devoted to Marc Chagall (1887 - 1985).

Produced by Culturespaces with the assistance of the Comité Marc Chagall, and created by Gianfranco Iannuzzi, Renato Gatto and Massimiliano Siccardi with the musical collaboration of Luca Longobardi, this new audio-visual show offers audiences a remarkable opportunity to discover the impressive oeuvre of Marc Chagall, an artist of Russian origin who obtained French nationality in 1937.

Most of the artist’s best-known masterpieces have been digitized and will be screened on the 5,000 m2 of the former stone quarry of Les Carrières de Lumières. A spectacular experience that promises to be a highly memorable one for the public! The first show focusing on a single artist at Les Carrières de Lumières, this new 2016 multimedia exhibition has been designed as a veritable journey through the major phases of the artist’s career.

Chagall: Midsummer Night’s Dreams is a story in twelve parts—Vitebsk, Life, Poetry, Collages, The War, Stained Glass, The Opéra Garnier, Daphnis and Chloé, Mosaics, The Circus, Illustrations and The Bible—presenting Chagall’s creativity in all its diversity, and his multiple sources of inspiration. The universal themes of love, the family, roots, the landscape, the circus, war, and music are perfectly showcased within the wonderful setting that are Les Carrières de Lumières.

For the first time, the close-ups of certain works featured in the collection of the Musée national Marc Chagall in Nice allow the visitor to see the artworks in a new light and to appreciate their depth and expressive richness. In addition to Chagall’s painted work, the show also reveals his collages, mosaics and stained glass windows, thereby illustrating the full range of Chagall’s talents. The show fills Les Carrières de Lumières with a sea of vibrant colours, characteristic of the artist’s palette, infusing the site with a poetic and particularly dynamic atmosphere.

The choice of the soundtrack accompanying the show has been guided by pianist Mikhaïl Rudy, a close friend of Marc Chagall’s. Music and images complement each other allowing audiences to revel in the majesty of the site. Reproductions of the artworks come to life on the ground, walls and columns of Les Carrières de Lumières, transformed into a giant screen for the occasion. Thanks to the use of cutting-edge technology, making use of 100 video projectors and 27 speakers, the spectator truly ‘enters into the work of the artist’, discovering up-close previously unnoticed or overlooked details.

Chagall’s modernity springs forth from the complexity of his brushstrokes, the range of his palette of colours, and his audacious compositions. Les Carrières de Lumières offer a rare opportunity to explore and discover the artist’s work.

Itinerary of the exhibition

- Vitebsk (Chagall's home town)
- Life (the couple, the lowers)
- Poetry (enchantment and utopia)
- Collages
- War
- Stained-Glass windows
- Ceiling of the Opéra Garnier
- Daphnis and Chloe
- Mosaics
- Circus
- Illustrations
- The Biblical message