Les Voyageurs by Cedric Le Borgne

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It’s the last days of December. I head off across Geneva to work. I am very late. It is minus 6 degrees. The wintery morning sky is crystal clear. My tram squeaks and rattles its way through Place Bel Air. I wipe the condensation from the window. I notice some guy in the street taking a photograph of something up in the air. I crane my neck to see what has caught his attention. There is a figure made of chicken wire hanging off a cable. I go back to my newspaper.

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Much too late the same day, I am back on the tram crossing Place Bel Air again but in the opposite direction. A cold dry wind is whistling down the lake. Night has fallen. I look up wondering what has happened to chicken-wire man. I spot him. He has been dramatically and intensely illuminated. I feel as though a fuse has been lit inside me. I see only a beautiful floating-flying figure. I leap out of my seat and tumble out onto the pavement. I am mesmerised. I dig into my bag for a camera. This will be a photographic challenge. I then notice a second glowing figure sitting high on a nearby building. I have an extraordinary and uplifting feeling that, out of the dozens of people hurrying home, I am the only person of interest to these luminous dudes.

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I look around me. There is another flying man high over the river. His poise is elegant. He is in some kind of communication with the first guy. They both seem to be having such fun; maybe comparing notes how best to glide in the freezing air?

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I turn and look at the tram stop. Another watchful figure surveys the scene. She is pensive, static and emanates a lightness of being. There is no doubt that she could, at any moment, simply lift off to swoop and loop with her companions. I’m sure they don’t really take much notice of us. But then I think maybe they are watching over us but in rather a distracted, amused and casual way.

Meet “Les Voyageurs” by Cedric Le Borgne. This is a masterful creation that has indeed travelled to many corners of the world. The figures give the impression that, with the blink of an eye, they could simply flit off into the night never to be seen again. The whole work pulls me into fantasy land; it represents a presence from another world. Rarely has an urban work captured me like this.

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However, at a more objective level and what I admire most about this work is Le Borgne’s technical mastery of what must be an incredibly difficult medium to work with. How does one bend and mould chicken-wire to create figures that are not only anatomically correct but also adopt a credible and pleasing human posture for a non-human activity (i.e., flying)? Visually, they work. This is why they do a little transport job on my spirits and my sense of reality. If you are late night shopping in the next couple of weeks, take stroll down to Bel Air. Let your spirits be transformed!

“Les Voyageurs” is a part of Geneva’s first Lux Festival. Other installations can be seen in Place Longemalle and on Ile Rousseau. I look forward to the second Lux festival.

Victoria’s Great Petition

The sun is rising. Jet-lag numbuzzes my head. I follow signs to the taxi rank at Melbourne’s Tullamarine airport. Ahmed is just a bit too chatty as he drives. He left Pakistan ten years ago. He loves Australia. “I got rights here, mate, you know!” I reflect that had he arrived here over a hundred years ago, he may not have said the same. When it comes to racial discrimination, this country has come a long way. (May be further than Switzerland!!) I am just in time for breakfast.

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“Great Petition,” 2008 by Susan Hewitt and Penelope Lee. Steel and bluestone.

Eggs Benedict force a stroll for a block or two. I squint gritty-eyed into a dazzling blue sky. Rush hour traffic and trams rush and rattle by. On a quieter patch of green behind the imposing Victoria State Houses of Parliament I find a huge creamy-white scroll-like metal structure unfurling itself. It speaks to time and paper and lots of both.

“Great Petition” by Susan Hewitt and Penelope Lee is urban sculpture at its best. It is at once arresting and intriguing. I love its setting and its narrative of political challenge. I tap it gently and think of the technical challenge of its construction.

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The Monster Petition – as it was then known – is 260 metres long and so heavy it had to be man(!)handled into the Victorian Parliament for its deposition in 1891. The Women’s Christian Temperance Union and the Victorian Women’s Suffrage Society amassed 30,000 signatures as evidence of the widespread support for equal voting rights for women. After several parliamentary setbacks, the Adult Suffrage Act was eventually passed in 1908. However, the State of Victoria denied aboriginal women their political rights until 1962.

Hewitt and Lee consulted widely in the design stage of their work. One emphatic request was made by a prominent ex-Parliamentarian: “Make it big so the blokes can see it!” When it comes to discrimination against women, this country has come a long way.

Fear and loathing in…… Switzerland!

As I write this blog post a United States health official announces another ebola case in Texas. Fear. There is the first talk of a flight lock-down to and from West Africa. President Barack Obama says the risk of an outbreak of ebola in the United States is “extremely low.”

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I hear there is an outdoor exhibition in Plainpalais organised by Geneva city council. It documents how the foreigner – read: immigrant, legal or illegal – has been depicted in Swiss political posters. It distracts me from this morning’s gloomy news. I am welcomed by a clever image playing on the Swiss flag and inequality. The posters dating back to the 1920s are both fascinating and alarming. I come to understand that a section of the Swiss political community consistently cultivates fear of the other with ingenious design concepts. This article is about the posters and how I see them as vehicles for political messages. As a general rule, I try not to express my own political views (even though I find some of the posters offensive!)

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The principal means of depicting unwelcome foreigners is by indicating their darker skin. According to this 2007 poster, the worst case is that they might en masse gain Swiss citizenship. The designer here has created a notion of multi-racial greedy-grabbing of those all-too-accessible Swiss passports. The darkest hand is particularly clawing.

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The same politicians really do not want others – especially if the others are muslims – bringing their culture to Switzerland. In 2009, the “Minarets debate” swirled about the limits of multiculturism. A black burqua-ed woman is clearly associated here with those black threatening minaret – missiles awaiting for their deadly countdown. The whole resonates with daily news of fundamental islamic terrorism.

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In most countries, displaying this 2007 poster would most likely end in a prison sentence. It is more than controversial. Kindly and innocent white sheep kick a black sheep out of Switzerland with a view to ensuring Swiss people more security. The furrowed brow of the black sheep indicates not surprise but his intent to get back in.

Fear generates loathing. Haven’t these people heard of Allport’s scale? Gordon Allport was an American psychologist who in the 1950s wrote about the nature of prejudice. He described a five step scale of prejudicial behaviour. At step one is “antilocution” – saying bad things to or about people of a minority. At step five on this scale is killing these same people. Come to think of it, maybe they have heard of Allport’s scale! This is just too awful to consider.

Let me emphasise that racial discrimination is not alive and well in Switzerland. The political parties responsible for the posters above are hotly opposed by the majority.

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This 2004 anti-discrimination poster is also included in the exhibition. It is effective probably because, in my mind, it is so cute. I love its United Colours of Bennetton recall. The babies are looking up to a united brighter future for their generation in the arms of a soft and cuddly nanny Switzerland.

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The issue is not new as shown by this poster from 1922. I can’t help being amused by image of the six steroetypical foreigners crossing the border into Basel where gold coin is lavished upon them. A multi-tasking black cat hisses at them and rings a warning bell. In parallel, Swiss people – presumably working in Germany just over the border – are kicked out of their homes.

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A poster from 1974 warns Swiss citizens that their nice stable economic pyramid should not be supported by “invited” labour. The immigrant labourer remains “invited” as long as he can be marked out by dark skin and thick mustache.

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In 1983 those hoping to induce fear of the foreigner show cute traditional little old Switzerland about to be mugged at home by a black – note the skin – youth – note the trainer with frayed lace. The poster also implies that attempting to keep foreigners out is a hopeless task! Any viewer who disaproves or disagrees of the poster is clearly one of the ambivalent grey citizens in the background.

I can’t help reflecting on the unlikely juxtaposition of messages I receive from the news and from these posters. The President of the United States – with darker skin – calms fears about the spread of the loathsome ebola virus. The City of Geneva reminds us that some Swiss politicians clearly aim to stoke fear – and loathing – about people with darker skin. Thanks, Geneva! I know which I fear most!