Traveling Exhibition “In-Utile: A Photographic Journey”

September 6–25, 2017
Opening reception: Wednesday, September 6, 2017, at 1:00 p.m.
Faculty of Education (Nîmes campus), 62 rue Vincent Faïta, Nîmes
 

Maxcasa captures the pointless gesture

Photographer Maxcasa presents a traveling exhibition born from the intersection of dance and photography, in pursuit of the “useless gesture”… On view starting September 6 at the Faculty of Education – Nîmes campus.
There are five of them, clad in form-fitting black and white costumes. A few words, then everything spirals out of control… A breathless race. The movements follow one another relentlessly; the dancers traverse, traverse, and exhaust the spaces. Their faces etched with exertion, their bodies cross paths, seize one another, embrace, or push each other away. Hearts race. Sweat beads on their faces under the strain. The costumes come loose, lost along the way…

In Search of the Pointless Gesture

Maxcasa’s keen eye captures the bodies set in motion by choreographer Leonardo Montecchia (Cie de la Mentira). This hard-to-categorize choreographer, who loves to observe our everyday gestures, spent several months in residence at the University of Montpellier in 2015 and 2016. Immersed in this “city within a city” with its 45,000 students and 4,500 staff members, Leonardo and his performers lived among its inhabitants, tracking down that rarity: the “useless gesture.”
Photographer Maxcasa now brings us the choreographer’s dynamic work through still images. “Everything is offered, but you have to seize it,” he says. “If you run slower than the dancers, you have no chance of finding your place. Run too fast, and they’ll have vanished behind a side door. Without warning, they create a dance space between two staircases or two walls.”

“Stories in the Spotlight”

A professional photographer based in Montpellier and a specialist in photojournalism, Maxcasa also works in portraiture, architecture, live performance, studio photography, and video. “I tell stories through light for the people I photograph. I look at them with a subjective and compassionate eye, remaining faithful to the trust they place in me. Responding to a smile with an image, constantly seeking the truth of a scene, bringing out the lines of a composition, letting myself be moved by a glance. Experiencing sublime moments, wonderful encounters, and unlikely situations—so as to forget nothing and make the most of everything we are given to see, in order to better offer it back.”
In-Utile. A choreographic journey, photographs by Maxcasa
Traveling exhibition at the UM, from September 2017 to spring 2018:

• from September 26 to October 28 at LIRMM;
• from October 30 to November 24 at STAPS (Veyrassi Stadium Hall);
• From November 27 to December 21 at the Richter Library.