Presentation of the residency Light Matters by Stéfane Perraud

• Can you introduce yourself? 

 Stéfane Perraud explores scientific and technological impasses through drawing, photography, sculpture and interactive installation. His multimedia aesthetics, which is essentially prospective, evokes an archaeology of the future.

One of the artist’s main subjects concerns light and how it relates, both symbolically and scientifically, to knowledge and disaster at the same time. Using diverse electronic techniques, notably light programming, his works interact with the viewer’s body, movement and perception, all the while bridging the histories of science and art.

• Can you present your project “Light Matters”?

“Light Matters” is a research on how light can interact with matter and how it could be considered as matter itself.

In this art and science collaboration project with the HOT (Hybrid Optomechanical Technologies) project these questions take centre stage of both the art and the scientific work. Light is ubiquitous in information and communication technology. HOT uses radiation pressure, through which light can push matter, to build a basis for new technologies that use or process electromagnetic radiation. This project will investigate this link between light and motion through an installation that uses HOT technologies.

The envisaged installation will use a number of thin wires in tension that will be vibrated through the use of light. In the middle of each wire, spectators will be able to appreciate a tiny spot of light that feeds a very small actuator linked to an optomechanical sensor and a piezoelectric actuator that will cause the wire to vibrate when illuminated. The wires will dance at different frequencies depending on their length and tension, like guitar strings, creating a surreal ballet of light.

• What do you expect from this residency? 

I’m thirsty of knowledge and collaborations, so I really want to discover a new field of work with the HOT team.