A few months before starting his residency in Valais, as part of the SMART program, the Colombian photographer Juan Arias had spotted on the Internet an article of the local newspaper “Le Nouvelliste” which held all his attention: “A wolf killed in the Val d’Anniviers, victim of a poaching act.” Working on the representation systems and archetypes that underlie social relations, with a particular interest in the forms of violence that are played at this level, Juan Arias immediately understood, instinctively, the significance of this incident. After dealing with topics such as the myth of the « pink dolphin » in Colombia, he decided to focus his attention on that of the wolf in Valais, in a dive that would lead him to discover the tenacious and ferocious tensions that still divide today this canton.

In his exhibition, Juan Arias creates an extremely ambitious project which consists in proposing a « radiography » of the contemporary Valaisan society, revealing his fears, his antagonisms, his preoccupations, through an anthropological glance taking the wolf like red thread. His photographs work as a set, a kaleidoscope of images and projections that interact with each other, in order to create a plurality of meanings and interpretations: a Rorschach test of a new order, bringing out our intimate wolf from his lair.

Varnishing

21^st  November 2017, 18:00, MAXXX Project Space, Sierre

Opening

22^th November – 10^th December 2017

Monday-Friday 17:00-19:00

Saturday-Sunday 14:00-17:00

Evening « «The wolf in the scientific discourse and the contemporary imagination»

Wednesday 29^th November 2017, 19:00, MAXXX Project Space, Sierre​

Evening « The return of the wolf  in Valais: situation and challenges »

Tuesday 5^th December 2017, 19:00, La Sacoche, Sierre