LES PARTICULES 

The human tale of dying water

MANON LANJOUÈRE

 

The first publication in the new CIVIS MARITIMUS collection

 

Les Particules, a human tale of dying water, a poetic and photographic manifesto for ocean preservation.

 

Through a poetic and artistic approach, this book invites deep reflection on ocean pollution. Each image, through its plastic beauty, invites contemplation, but also, through its visual force, action. A book that testifies to the power of artistic creation to transform society.

 

© Manon Lanjouère, Les particules, Pectanthis

 

With Les Particules, conte humain d’une eau qui meurt, artist Manon Lanjouère tackles the subject of plastic water pollution and its dramatic consequences for the planet, health and the lives of all living beings.

 

© Manon Lanjouère, Les particules, Tubularia et Asterionellopsis

 

Through never-before-seen photographs and personal accounts, Manon Lanjouère highlights the omnipresence of invisible plastic particles in our bodies and our environment, underlining the need to react quickly and take concrete measures to combat this pollution

 

Manon Lanjouère forges spectral images that resemble a new nosology. Her classification of the mutations that transform underwater life forms into a repertoire of refuse borrows notably from the photographic iconography of plants in the early nineteenth century.

 

michel poivert, Photography historian and curator

 

© Manon Lanjouère, Les particules, Emiliania

 

Inspired by Anna Atkins’ British Algae herbarium, or Ernst Haeckel’s sublime plates on Nature’s Artistic Forms, Manon Lanjouère uses various photographic processes such as cyanotype to represent this underwater world. She uses the waste products themselves – cotton buds, ballpoint pens, hairbrushes… and other plastic objects found on beaches – to reproduce the shapes of endangered species. Ballpoint pens become thalassionema nitzschiode and a simple hair elastic, guinardia striata.

 

© Manon Lanjouère, Les particules, Tomopteris-helgolandica

 

The marvels of science and its literary fictions promised both knowledge and the illusion of mastery over nature. Now, however, waste is a species in its own right.

 

michel poivert, Photography historian, INTroduction exerpt 

CONVERSATION

PARTICLES: ART AND SCIENCE INTERSECT OVER AN INVISIBLE THREAT

Interview conducted by Andreina de Bei (editor-in-chief and photo editor at Sciences et Avenir-La Recherche)
Between Manon Lanjouère (visual artist) and Ika Paul-Pont, marine ecotoxicology researcher at LEMAR, specializing in the effects of micro- and nanoplastics on coastal ecosystems.

 

Extracts :
ADB Was it the fragility and beauty of these creatures, Manon, that inspired and motivated you?

ML Of course, and even more striking for me was the realization that they play a fundamental role in the balance of ecosystems, since phytoplankton – microalgae and cyanobacteria – carry out photosynthesis, absorbing CO2 and releasing oxygen. Imagining that this vital function for the planet, performed by wonderful and intriguing-looking creatures, was being severely compromised by plastic pollution, fired my imagination and fuelled the creative process that led to the Les Particules project.

IPP The fragility you mention is more than proven. Our research has demonstrated the impact of microplastics and nanoplastics on phytoplankton: by interacting with these living organisms, the pollutants modify their distribution in the water column and their floating speed, adhere to them and thus form aggregates that are toxic for the entire food chain, and worse, reduce their ability to photosynthesize by almost 45%. It’s invisible, and tragically harmful.

ADB Is your artistic process akin to scientific research?

ML Research, without a doubt. I’m not trained as a scientist, nor do I claim to be, but I find the sciences very inspiring, and they constantly nourish me.My projects are all framed by a protocol, on the basis of which I construct an image, as one would do in laboratory experiments. I then apply the process ad infinitum, and through this iteration, I wear out the form to the end.For me, laboratories are playgrounds!

Download Press Kit

 

ABOUT MANON LANJOUÈRE

 

Manon Lanjouère is an artist based in Saint-Malo (Brittany). After studying the history of art at the Sorbonne, she decided to focus fully on photography and attended the Ecole des Gobelins in 2014, graduating in 2017 as one of the top students in her class. Her involvement with the theatre has influenced her photography, which is shaped by staging and set design. Manon Lanjouère’s work focuses mainly on environmental issues and relationships. Immersed in private, physical or metaphysical spaces, where science and poetry meet, her multidisciplinary work probes our imaginations.

 

In 2022, Manon Lanjouère won the Prix Photographie & Sciences and was artist-in-residence on the schooner Tara.
In 2023, she is the winner of the prestigious François Schneider Foundation Contemporary Talent Prize.
This project will be exhibited at the Académie du Climat, Paris, from September 14 to October 15, 2023, as part of the Photo Climat Biennial.