Laurent Grasso in Magic and Power: From magic carpets to drones

Vibration, stupefaction, "delicious horror" are as many words to qualify the experience of the sublime: this singular feeling of attraction mixed with terror that we experience when we are confronted to the outburst and power of the elements. Born at the heart of the 18th century, this aesthetic and philosophic concept weaves the main thread of a reinterpretation of the humanity passionate history with nature.

Gathering over a hundred artists, architects and filmmakers worldwide, “The tremors of the world” offers a dialogue between ancient and contemporary works. It explores the ambivalent and persisting attraction for the “Nature too far” and catastrophes.

At a time of ecological upheavals and alarmist statements, the exhibition also explores two radical changes in the concept of the sublime: the spectator realising his partial responsibility in the disordered world, and the catastrophe itself, now invisible under the effects of our activity. Lastly, the exhibition evokes the resurgence, since the 60’s, of a rekindled bond with nature… An aspiration for re-enchantment, a quest of fusion, reviving a more contemplative iconography of the sublime.

In this journey fluctuating between a philosophy of the 18th century and a contemporary vision, the aesthetics questions cross paths with actual ethic positions and ecological debates. The road outlined by the artists’ investigation, successively watchers and exhibitors, illuminated by a small light perceivable by those who are attentive to it, sheds lights on the tumultuous history of a ravaging and ravaged passion between an occupying specie and its ecosystem. For more information, please visit marta-herford.de.