“I’ve always been very creative with my mind, with quite abstract, immaterial, intangible, and literary ideas.”
Name
Sophie Blet
Profession
Artist
Website
Where are you from?
I was born in Paris, then lived in different places in Germany such as Leipzig, and now in Marseille for the last 3 years.
Your style in 3 words?
(un)folded, time-scaled, liminal
Your weakness? Your strength?
My desire is to project myself into other scales of time, of matter and states, into literary spaces.
Accommodate myself with the physical world.
What makes you different?
All, as everyone.
When did you decide to become an artist?
I’ve always been very creative with my mind, with quite abstract, immaterial, intangible, and literary ideas. Then I decided to study art history, and when I discovered that these abstract ideas could be displaced and challenged by the form and that these experiences could be shared, I began to study art in art schools.
Do you choose your art form, or does the form choose you?
There is of course an unfinished dialogue between what I want to do, what I wanted to do and what I did, what I thought I wanted to do, and what the form says. I begin with some intentions, and then very intuitively, and on a scale of 1. So there is a long process of letting go, listening, observing what the form says, what sometimes an accident says, sometimes it comes back to a thinking process, and thereafter a time to adjust and balance everything. I like those moments of doubt and uncertainty when the form becomes a question, they often lead me to ideas for the next projects, as if the practice would feed on itself.
What do you find most fascinating about the creative process?
The loneliness, the infinite possibilities of the creative process.
A few words about your favorite creation?
I would say that “The white shadow” condenses a lot of what I want to talk about, as the double, the reversibility of time, and the liminal and movable states I try to give form to. I’m interested in those intermediary states between nothing and something, what could be and what is, in perception thresholds, trying to capture dynamics of continuity, separation, transition, and overlapping. In the sculpture “The white shadow”, two parallel blades are placed on their cutting edge. One in metal and its symmetrical double in wax. As on the edges of the tables of the Stilllifes paintings, the balanced knives evoke the idea of a fall to come, reminding us of the fragility and irreversibility of existence. Here, the wax blade – the material of the draft- suggests a parallel existence whose potentialities are still open, reversible, and malleable.
Someone else’s work that inspired or inspires you…
The Double Life of Veronique ( Krzysztof Kieslowski – 1991) explores the story of a double existence, that of Weronika, Polish, and Véronique, French. Psychically linked by a destiny that’s crossed, and perhaps reversible.
The death of one, who passes away during her first concert as a chorister, seems to significantly change the life of the other, giving rise to the idea of another to oneself, of life and its double, of life and its possible draft.
Who would you like to work with someday and why?
I already worked and still work with physicians and cosmologists about questions of time, and I really would love to work with neuroscientists about consciousness, and perception, about memory.
A new project coming up or an idea you want to work on?
I am currently working on my next solo show which will also be the occasion to publish my first monograph. Conceived as an open and extended archive, that could be recombined and increased, this edition will bring together images of my work and also texts I wrote as well as texts of different nature from other authors. As an endless memory that could rearrange itself.
Finish the sentence „More important than my career is…“
The preservation of nature and of all kinds of species that are living in.
2023: Where are we going?
rethinking paradigms
Do you think about time as an artist?
Yes, in a philosophical and physical way. In the contrast between the cosmological time and a human time.
When the going gets tough…
I go through imagination.
Put on your future vision glasses: What direction is our generation moving in, what will our world look like in 50 years?
I hope we will have made huge progress on axiological questions – on what we want to put into society as human beings – and even more huge progress on concrete actions on climate change and social equality.
What would you do if you could change the World?
Go faster with concrete actions about climate and social equality.
What does freedom mean when it comes to art?
It’s the freedom to continue work and to share it, to discuss it, and to meet researchers from other fields.
If the universe is everything and it’s expanding, what is it expanding into?
That’s the fascinating problem of the infinite.
Tell us about your future plans…
I’m moving to another studio and preparing for my next solo show in Paris beginning in 2024.
Tell us about your future plans…
I’m moving to another studio and preparing for my next solo show in Paris beginning in 2024.
Your city’s favorite spots?
I really like some coffees as “La brûlerie Moka”, and the program of the Festival Actoral which brings together authors, directors, choreographers, performers, and artists.
A book that everyone should read…
For the last year, I’ve been obsessed with The Sphinx of the Work by Bruno Latour and Isabelle Stengers about The Different Modes of Existence, which explores existential pluralism.
Last but not least: what is your favorite Song?
I would say the Opera Einstein on the Beach with the Knee play 5 from Philip Glass.
One last statement please: „Wood or stone, gold or art?”
Maybe wood, because it could become all the others.
Your #…?
