Beaux Arts Special Edition / JR - Return to the cave

WRITTEN IN FRENCH

As part of its restoration work, the Paris National Opera invited the artist JR to dress the scaffolding covering the monument with two successive installations. The first act, September 2023, showed the entrance to an immense cavern, evoking both the origins of song and dance in ancient...

WRITTEN IN FRENCH

As part of its restoration work, the Paris National Opera invited the artist JR to dress the scaffolding covering the monument with two successive installations. The first act, September 2023, showed the entrance to an immense cavern, evoking both the origins of song and dance in ancient Greece but also Plato's allegory of the cavern - a place where the exit leads to knowledge and understanding of the world. In its second act, the building faded away to show the very walls of the cave, covered with a hundred human footprints. The cave thus became a sanctuary protecting its inhabitants from the violence of the world. The darkness gave way to light. If the first act referred to the origins of ballet and opera, the second act was more anchored in parietal art. Final scene, on November 12, the cavern that enveloped the facade of the Opera was transformed into a live show, revealing 153 dancers on a 30m high scaffolding. A performance choreographed by Damien Jalet to music by Thomas Bangalter.

Beaux Arts Éditions followed step by step the design and production of this extraordinary production and goes backstage of this unique multi-sensory creation through decryption, interviews and photo reports.

French
84 pages - August 28, 2024