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Artwork Description

In this new series of lava stone sculptures, Charrière populates the darkened room with volcanic creatures, seemingly crawling through the space like isopods on a seafloor. Dotted with obsidian eyes, these artworks gaze at us from a liminal space somewhere between stratigraphy and reality, acting as genius loci to the dark corners where many scientists believe planetary life first emerged: deep sea hydrothermal vents, also known as black smokers. Discovered in 1977, such underwater volcanoes where first found at spreading ridges and convergent plate boundaries, acting as host to a surprising diversity of organisms dependent on the chemical interaction between seawater and hot magma. It speaks not only to tectonics as a possible contributor for organic life to develop, but the watchful eyes of the sculptures are also a reminder of the animism left behind in our progression towards a historically more dualistic and anthropocentric worldview.