This is la mort

Started in 1920 by art historian Aby Warburg, the Mnemosyne Atlas is an immense collection of images that brings together paintings, photographs of sculptures and events, maps of the sky and the world. Placed side by side, the images are enlarged, revealing connections and echoes through time, proposing new ways of reading shapes, figures and symbols, while disrupting the chronology of events. Zoé Lakhnati draws inspiration from this Atlas to depict characters from different eras and places. Often conquerors, heroes or entertainers, these seemingly unwavering entities take turns on stage, exposing their failures, defeats and mortality. This is la mort, stages the weight of these capitalist, body-built and victorious bodies as they collapse — like a big “flop.” The body becomes a container for memories, allowing dramatic, tragic and theatrical images to appear and disappear. The idea of the stage as a space of glory is overturned by the decay of these fantasized figures.