Winner of the SAM 2021 prize, artist Dalila Dalléas Bouzar has been invited to the Palais de Tokyo to present Vaisseau infini, a monumental embroidery project created in Tlemcen by professional and amateur Algerian embroiderers.
At the Palais de Tokyo, Vaisseau infini unfolds in the form of a large tent that welcomes the public and numerous events. The embroidery interprets a vast collection of drawings made by the artist on the site of Tassili N'Ajjer, a rocky plateau in the Sahara Desert in southern Algeria where, for several millennia, people have drawn their history and environment in the open on the stone walls, making the Tassili a unique testimony to human history, its relationship with nature and animals, the evolution of its behavior and its representations of gender and sexuality. Dalila Bouzar sees in these drawings the representation of a utopia: the distant past from which they originate constitutes for her a continuum that transports us to an infinite future, beyond the histories linked to domination that make up Algeria's recent past.
A meditative, dreamlike, intimate and ritualized space, the Vaisseau infini tent, conducive to attention and listening, welcomes the public and invites them to listen to the Vintage Arab podcasts designed and produced by Hajer Ben Boubaker, as well as a sound creation by Paloma Colombe. Throughout the autumn, philosophers, artists, historians and others will share their thoughts and stories.
Vaisseau infini is produced with the support of SAM Arts Projects and the French Embassy in Algeria, the Institut français d'Algérie, the Institut Français de Tlemcen, DRAC Nouvelle Aquitaine and DMC.
