To celebrate its 230th anniversary, the Louvre welcomes 20 contemporary artists, each with a strong connection to the city of Paris. Louvre Looks, involves people under 40, giving them the opportunity to shoot a short video inside the museum, capturing the spectacular works to create extraordinary scenes with an almost surreal feel. Young artists from the worlds of painting, film, fashion or music have already made their mark in their fields, establishing themselves as protagonists of contemporary creativity. Along the process, they have made the museum their muse, showing in the video the Louvre’s collections to which they feel particularly attached through an entirely personal vision and interpretation. In three and a half minutes each of them experimented with different working methods, trying their hand with film crews or their personal cell phones, some during visiting hours during the day and others at night surrounded only by the works, using digital resources or focusing on their personal connection to their surroundings.
Ariana Papademetropoulos, through the conception of the video for Louvre Looks decides to dream and accomplish something she could never have done if not through this project. The artist perceives the experience at the Louvre as a journey of the mind through surreal and wonderful reigns, comparing it to dreaming: when we sleep is the only time in which we can freely fantasize letting ourselves be transported to other dimensions. Ariana in “A Mon Seul Désir”, the title of the video, floats on a bed through many masterpieces that come to life and join her on the incredible journey, some physically and some spiritually. From the very first scene we see her lying under the blankets as she wakes up in the Louvre’s largest room, the Salle des États, with the Mona Lisa behind her. Her awakening is caused by the noise of her doppelganger ruining a painting in the room. The bed immediately comes to life and starts to move: during the journey the artist encounters several characters, including Venus, played by Harris Reed, who shows her the correct way, Saint Sebastian, and King Francis I of France, portrayed by Sebastian Tellier, who nearly joins Ariana in the bed. The latter at the end of the video moves according to his will and transports her to her final destination: the cave of a mythological Greek painting by Bartolomeo di Giovanni.
“The artists show us different ways of looking at the Louvre and new, contemporary ways of creating with the museum, confirming its role as a contemporary site of art.”
The title, which can be interpreted as “my only wish”, derives from the most enigmatic of Lady and the Unicorn tapestries, where the lady slipping the necklace into her chest is thought to be a renunciation of temptation, a theme echoed in the short film. Indeed, the bed in the film represents the subconscious mind that dominates Ariana’s desires until she awakens from the dream. Nowadays any visitor can film or take photographs during a tour of the museum.In fact, the Louvre initiates this project with its audience and video as a means of communication in mind, tangible to both ordinary people and established film-makers, who in entirely different ways share their vision of the spaces and the works on display. Ariana with the project suggest the strong connection between herself and the museum, showing a desire for a journey through the works that expresses the power of her subconscious appear. Besides Ariana Papademetropoulos, the other artists involved are Ivan Argote, Hicham Berrada, Anton Bialas and Kamilya Kuspanova, Mykki Blanco and Dachi-Giorgi Garuchava, Bianca Bondi, Guillaume Bresson, Jacob Bromberg, Théo Casciani, Pan Daijing, David Douard, Eliza Douglas, Jennifer Douzenel, Mimosa Echard, Miles Greenberg, Rafik Greiss, Marie Jacotey, Christelle Oyiri, Edgar Sarin and Marine Serre.
