Ariane Michel

Through her videos, Ariane Michel aims to change our perceptions of the natural world. In her videos owls, trees, walruses, horses are the actors, becoming almost human and identifiable. The work exhibited at Gallifet is one of Michel's first and typical of her artistic approach. ‘Aprés les pluies’ (After the rains) invites us to visit the forests of the Gard, after the violent floods of September 2002. We discover the destruction left in aftermath;  land that has become a hostile space, desolate yet majestic. We meet a stray dog, who guides us. With him, we walk the rugged ground, smell the atmosphere and are surprised by birdsong or the rustle of leaves. Cinema allows us to experience the physical, auditory and temporal relationship that the dog has with its environment.

Michel’s work projects us immediately into the animal's perception of the world. Pushing against the constructed boundaries between of "nature" and "culture", she re-establishes a continuity between Man, his environment and the animals that inhabit it. There is no distinct moral judgement in her work, but rather a poetic and sensitive invitation to deconstruct our anthropocentric conception of the world.