Aurélien Lafargue
Aurélien Lafargue is a visual artist. He works with projected image, light and space, in the form of installations, live performances and site-specific pieces. His current research turns on the ocean and the living world.
Aurélien Lafargue is a visual artist, trained as a photographer. Since 2002 he has been developing a practice of image, light and space, through installations, audiovisual performances, site-specific works and interactive pieces.
His work often starts from places and from what makes them: an architecture, a volume, a material, a memory, a landscape. Projection becomes for him a way of transforming how a space is perceived, of displacing its landmarks and letting new forms of narrative appear in it.
Music holds an important place in his path. A real-time video artist and stage designer, he has worked with artists such as 20Syl, Max Cooper, Blockhead and Afrika Bambaataa, developing visual writing conceived in close relation to sound and performance.
His career has also been built on the border between art, design and technological research. For more than three years he worked with Cisco Video France on research and development for Snowflake, a project devoted to new uses of television, shown at NAB, CES and IBC among others.
Founder of the Nature Graphique studio and director of MAPP France, he has for about a decade also taught students and professionals — video mapping, light, spatial narrative and interactivity.
His work has been shown or developed in contexts as different as the Société des arts technologiques in Montréal, Stéréolux, Scopitone, the Institut du monde arabe and the Carrières de Lumières.
Today his research concentrates more closely on the relation to places, to their memory and to their landscapes. Architecture, heritage, ocean and the living world are gradually becoming the materials of a practice in which the image does not merely cover a space, but attempts to propose another reading of it.
What the image does to the eye — geometry, optics, the point at which a form stops being what we took it for.
Works written for one place alone, where the wall or the façade imposes its constraint and becomes the scale of the work.
The ocean as subject and as medium — working with it rather than depicting it.
Exhibitions, performances and site-specific works — a selection
- 2012Le Point, Trajectoires, MétamorphoseCarrières de LumièresA-part festivalcreation (immersive mapping, augmented video mapping, immersive projection); Métamorphose with Yoan Le Bobinnec
- 2012Espace TempsSatosphère, Société des arts technologiques · Montréalimmersive creation combining projected image and contemporary dancevisual creation
- 2012Les Mille et Une NuitsInstitut du monde arabe · Parismonumental audiovisual creation for the opening of the exhibitionvisual creation
- 2012Scopitone — 2012 to 2014 editionsScopitone · Nanteslight work, live video and digital scenography, across three editionsvisual creation and scenography
- 2013Patterns emergeStéréolux · Nantes3D mapping on a composition of volumesdirection artistique et motion design
- 2013Totem AEspace Cosmopolis · Nantesinstallation and mapping on a structurevisual creation
- 2014Ma petite histoire numériqueStéréolux · Nantesinteractive creation and artistic presentationcreation
- 2014Max Cooper — live videoScopitone / Stéréolux · Nantesvisual creation and performancevisual creation and live performance
- 2015Ganymède (adaptation 360°) et EntropiaSatosphère, Société des arts technologiques · MontréalIX Symposium; Ganymède also in the SAT’s regular programme in June 2015art direction (Ganymède, with Mourad Bennacer); co-creation (Entropia, with Fraction, Louis-Philippe St-Arnault and Création Ex Nihilo)
- 2015L’ÉchappéeChâteau des ducs de Bretagne, rempart sud · NantesScopitone / Nantes Digital Week — created with 20sylcreation
- 2015Rampe UNantes · Saint-Nazaire · Angersinstallation and audiovisual performance with 20sylvisual creation
- 2015Cymatic LiveAstropolis / tournée Madbenvisual creation and live performancevisual creation
- 2016Métamorphose urbaineHôtel de Ville · Dakaropening of the Dakar Biennale of Contemporary Art, 3 May 2016; collaborative work arising from a creation workshopwork led by Aurélien Lafargue and Mourad Bennacer
- 2016Festival international de harpeAncenisvisual creation and live performancevisual creation
- 2017RéfractionFestival Rêverie Modernecreationvisual artist, with Mourad Bennacer (sound design)
- 2017EntropiaMUTEK / Satosphère · Montréalpresentation of the immersive installation-performance developed in Montréalco-creation
- 2017ScopitoneScopitone · Nanteslive video, structure and digital scenographyvisual creation and performance
- 2018DédalesVanneslive visual performance in an exhibition and digital-culture contextaudiovisual performance
- 2019Hyper CubeWeb2day, sous les Nefs · Nanteslive audiovisual performance on a structure of cubesvisual artist, VJ and stage designer
- 2019RéfractionFesti Lumi, Bonifacio · Halle 6 Ouest, Nantestouring of the audiovisual installation built around a reflective sculpture and immersive projectionsvisual creation, with Mourad Bennacer (sound design)
- 2019PROCESSProcess Synchrone · Quimperaudiovisual structure and live performance — first installation of the structurevisual creation and performance
- 2019ATRIUMNantesinteractive installationcreation
- 2019NETWORKVideo Mapping Festival · Lillearchitectural mapping; creation residency at Arenberg Creative Minecreation
- 2021DédalesVanneslive audiovisual performanceaudiovisual performance
- 2022LINKNantes Digital Week · Nantescollective architectural mapping for the opening of Nantes Digital Weekcollective creation
- 2023IMMERSEAAbri du Canot de sauvetage · Étellive architectural mapping, two eveningscreation, with the cooperation of Mourad Bennacer and Jonathan Lefebvre
- 2023Un Océan d’Histoire(s)Hôtel Gabriel · Lorientarchitectural mapping for the city’s 357th anniversary, with the Heritage and Archives departmentvisual creation, light and scenography (Nature Graphique)
- 2023SingularitéBastion, Festi Lumi · Bonifacioarchitectural mapping, retrospective exhibition of the painters of Bonifaciovisual creation (Nature Graphique — Aurélien Lafargue)
- 2024Bleu(s)scenography, video, light and visual staging for a piece on domestic violence; directed by Perrine Fages, Les Totors Folies Théâtre companyscenography and video
- 2024Les Eyzies — first workMusée national de Préhistoire · Les Eyzies, Dordognefirst work in the cycle devoted to the biodiversity of the Vézère valleycreation and art direction
- 2025L’Arbre-MondeMusée national de Préhistoire — Les Secrets de la Falaise · Les Eyzies, Dordognesecond work in the cycle — monumental mapping on a cliff face, on forest, geology, wetlands and the cycles of the living worldcreation and art direction (Nature Graphique — Aurélien Lafargue)
- 2026Les Eyzies — third workVallée de la Vézère · Les Eyzies, Dordognemonumental creation on the living world and its environmentscreation and art direction
Residencies and research
- 2013GanymèdeStéréolux · Nantescreation residency, research on the Leap Motion gesture interfaceart direction
- 2018Hors Cadres / Cadres2vieInstitut français de Madagascar · Antananarivoresidency, site-specific work, workshop and group exhibition, as part of Novembre numériqueconcept, creation and workshop
- 2021Virtuel TangibleL’Echonovafirst residencycreation
- 2021DigitaliumNiortresearch into a 360° immersive concept on rare metalsresearch
- 2025EGGresearch on the egg, the embryo, origin and the metaphysics of creationresearch and writing
- 2025La biodiversité nomaderesearch and writing on nomadic projections of local wildliferesearch and writing
- 2026ABÎMESprototype for an immersive installation on the oceancreation
- 2026CONTRE-MARÉEoceanic bestiary — sculpture, light and moving image; prototypejoint creation with the sculptor Arthur Thoyer Rozat
Studies
- 2025Vincennes — authored studyChâteau de Vincenneswriting, archives and art direction — a design study, with no production attachedconcept and art direction
Education
- 2012Société des arts technologiquesMontréal2012–2013 — interactivity, node-based programming, 360° immersive video and immersive cinema
- —ETPApractising photographer
- —MJMmultimedia and graphic design
- —CAP photographie
