SPOT / FRANCK MILTGEN / MERCIER BUILDING - POST / 2017
Float glass and stainless steel 233 x 370 x 78 cm, 2017
Created by the artist Franck Miltgen, Spot makes reference to the history of the Mercier building. This glass sculpture is a full-scale replica of a rocky wall from the old Mercier champagne cellars, located under this building of the same name. It owes its appearance to the juxtaposition of elements: hollowed-out rock with cut stone. Thus, the artist chose to make this place, which is not public, accessible.
Spot encourages introspection: this intimacy, accentuated by the bench, creates a kind of meditative bubble, a Spot, where one can find themselves. Thanks to 3D scanning technology, this volume offers us an unprecedented perspective. The wall’s surface has been imagined in two different ways: the side facing out reflects the original wall while the artist imagined the side facing the bench. Franck Miltgen thereby conceived an object that reveals how the real and material world is connected with the digital one.
Paradoxically, the layers of transparent glass lend an opaque, physical and mineral quality. These glass layers also recall the raw material of champagne bottles. There is upward movement to the new entity: at the bottom, a reference to the dark cellars, towards the top, the atrium and the fluidity of its light.
Due to its location in a heavily trafficked area, Spot modifies the flow of movement, while the perception of the object changes according to the visitor’s perspective. Spot is thus in direct connection with a central idea in the artist’s work: material texture as a way to attract the public’s attention.
