Videos Janis Rafa-Nemělce of Greek origin, which works between Athens and Amsterdam, the work presented these days in the center of VOX, will encourage us to think about our relationship with animals. It should be said that the subject challenges …
The look we have in the animal world is often derogatory. Word animal He is negatively consoled and symbolically refers to a poorly elevated, stupid or even violent person. The word animal can also define a similar world. Categorizes a person who is codimed with “Beast Like and Goose”, “Beast Like and OnKey”, “Beast Like and Pig” or “Beast to eat hay” … also serves to indicate an individual under his influence of his lower instinct : camel, buctor, dog, rat … and this negative imagination associated with an animal is not specific to the French language. In Western art, in the still life, the representation of a parrot or monkey has long reported how sticky people, thieves, deceptive or hypocrisy, vices that would be specific to animals could be …
Change the view of the world
“Animals play a crucial role in my work to introduce the world differently, which we believe we understand. However, our reading was made thanks to a completely anthropocentric approach, ”explains Janis Rafa. “My work wants to think about a tamed animal, dominated or even freedom to understand who we are, an animal serving as a mirror of our behavior.” In addition to approaching the issue of animal ethics or even aesthetics inspired by animals, my work is used to understand who we are. In fact, it is a reflection on the hierarchy that we built with the animal, whether it is because we love them, need them, used them or want to eat them. »»
However, the situation is developing AI When animals remain legally simple objects today, they now have very few rights, they are now protected in the case of serious abuse and poor treatment … “Things are slowly changing. The animal is far from being considered our same. And people who come to see my exhibitions often consider that my videos make them uncomfortable because they sometimes see dead animals – in context, though cinematographic – but the same people do not hesitate to put meat on the plate. »»
An exhibition that includes a video, among other things Landscape depression (2023) – which gives its name to all presented cannons – a video showing inexplicably sleeping, symbolically apathetic humanity, unable to respond to the current problems represented by the ecological crisis, and the world of animals that finally released from the dominion of the human race.
“But my work does not talk about our relationship with animals simply from the perspective of the ecological crisis, but also in a more sensitive way, more in relation to the nature of animals. I am talking about the similarities that we have with many of them, including the capacity of sensitivity, empathy. »»
But what is a great interest in the work of Rafa is that it is not an illustration of thoughts of our relationships with animals. Rafa does not do documents about animal life. In his very cinematographic videos, a very exploded narrative and formal structure will be able to create this horror we have in the world. This strangeness embodies the desire to thwart autisms perception and understanding. “Thanks to my knowledge of cinematographic art, I can subvert reality when we see it to give it a thickness.” »»
The work of Rafa participates in the repetition of the present animal in the work of many contemporary artists. For example, the IBGHY and Lemmens duo created Community library for birds (2021), “containing different tools that birds use for different purposes, from searching food to back scratches, gaming browsing, door hooks and opening different objects” that shows how animals as well as humans, as well as humans, It can develop tools and transmit knowledge to generations by their colleagues.
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