“A Second of Eternity” in the Bourse de Commerce

“A Second of Eternity” brings together some fifteen artists whose works are able to generate a space-time. They are displayed throughout the spaces, composing a landscape that enters into dialogue with the architecture, from the darkness of the lower level to the light of the upper galleries. Kharkiv-born Ukrainian photographer Boris Mikhaїlov is among the artists represented in Pinault, with his Journal Ukrainien.

Rotunda of the Bourse de Commerce is dedicated to the cosmic, and nocturnal work by artist Anri Sala. Time No Longer (2021), a video projected onto a vast, curved screen, perfectly marrying the Rotunda’s cylindrical forms, is a recent work by the artist and this is its French premiere. Anri Sala transformed the Bourse de Commerce into a soundbox for the world, making the space resonate through music.

The work shows a weightless turntable rotating on its axis, into the ISS. The solo was composed for the musician Henri Akoka, with whom Messiaen was held prisoner in a camp by the Nazis. Akoka only played the piece once, in 1941, for his fellow prisoners. The sound of clarinet is combined with the sound of saxophone, evoking another tragedy, of Ronald McNair, a saxophonist who dies in the explosion of the Challenger.