From January 31, 2025
The latest creation from Carrières des Lumières takes you back to the first steps of naive art in France. Spontaneous, dreamlike, sometimes childlike, this new approach to painting is embodied in the works of Henri Rousseau.
“I don’t know if you’re like me, but when I walk into these greenhouses and see these strange plants from exotic countries, it feels like I’m entering a dream.”
Derided by his contemporaries, but admired by avant-gardists such as Delaunay, Apollinaire, Picasso and Kandinsky, his idealistic painting, with its bright colors and clumsy perspectives, would later break free from the academic norms of the time, paving the way for modernism in painting.
Henri Rousseau helps you rediscover the Paris of the industrial era, populated by frozen characters who observe us under a sky where zeppelins and hot-air balloons float. Without ever having left France, he also weaves a colorful tale in the heart of a dense plant kingdom where the eyes of tigers pierce the foliage and the landscapes transport us to imaginary lands.
In this parallel universe, where the reality of everyday life is invaded by a profusion of dreamlike details, the man who was nicknamed “Douanier” (customs officer) because of his job at the Paris octroi office, invites us to escape, dreaming with eyes wide open, from France to a jungle with the scent of Eden.
Production: Culturespaces Studio ® / Artistic creation: Nicolas Charlin / Stage direction and animation: Cutback / Music supervision and mixing : Start-Rec