As part of the 14th Gwangju Biennale, which runs from April 7 to July 9, 2023, the Gwangju Media Arts Platform (G.MAP) has initiated a collaborative project. This project is part of the UNESCO Creative Cities Network, a worldwide association of over 295 cities, of which Gwangju is a member.
For this project, G.MAP and the city of Gwangju selected five artists, each representing a city renowned for its creativity in the media arts. Romain Lalire had the honor of being chosen to represent the French town of Enghien-les-Bains, a member of the UNESCO Digital Arts Network since 2013.
The 22 cities in the UNESCO network dedicated to the digital arts are coordinated by the town of Enghien-les-Bains, via its Centre des Arts. These cities work together to promote creativity and innovation in the digital arts worldwide.
Entitled "Fragment 49.021429 N 2.267299 E", this monumental work was created from 3D scans of the Montmorency forest, which has been weakened by ink disease (70% of the forest's total surface area is affected). This video is part of a long-term project entitled "FRAGMENTS", initiated as part of the Western XR residency in Vancouver.
Using LiDAR (a remote sensing technology), the artist was able to capture the very essence of this fragile ecosystem by recreating it through a particularly immersive cloud of particles.
Romain Lalire is one of the few French artists to use and master this technology, which enables complex details to be captured in difficult conditions.
