In honour of Marcellin Albert

A group of plastic artists and musicians presented at the cooperative cave of Bize-Minervois the premisses of a travelling exhibition which will commemorate the first century of the wine revolt of 1907.

Fernand Soual, Bruno Sellenet, Daniel Bégard, Jomy et Raoul Cuadrado, Chantal Cazeaux and François Viguié are artists who attest a wine culture and a deep attachment to the social and cultural life of the Languedoc.

According to the timetable of the demonstrations in 1907, they will exhibit, in villages and from town to town, from Perpignan to Carcassonne and then to Nîmes, huge commemorative works which are also linked to the present problems in wine careers.

In order to denounce the loss of sense in the farm-produce industry and tell the feeling of helplessness of actual and former wine growers, to cast a contemporary look on the events of that time, those artists will present the “mémorial pour les âmes vidées” (the “memorial for the worn out souls”).

There’s a mysterious lighting in the 72 cubic metre structure (by Daniel Bégard). The twelve boxes of the “indiscernabilité” (by Bruno Sellenet) are right-angled parallelepipeds the size of which nearly fits that of a human being: they show pieces of graphic arts through. The closest to the eyes are very different from those in the backwards which are supposed to generate the first.

Raoul Cuadrado created boardings, 16 or 18, like barricades, as well as a figurative sculpture made of steel tubes and representing Marcellin Albert haranguing the crowd with a megaphone.

Piled up pallets and plastics, representing closed doors and gates, evoke the unused productivity, “inexorable surenchère à l’inertie industrielle” (“inexorable outbidding of the industrial inertia”) (by Fernand Soual).

1907 “pioupious” (“tommies”), pieces of barrels painted to the colours of the french flag, symbolize the army’s refusal to fire at the wine growers. They’ll be more and more numerous to be deployed as the exhibition will progress. (The “pioupious” is a work by Chantal Cazeaux, François Viguié and Jomy Cuadrado, the “Trio d’en bas” who will accompany the exhibition with songs).

The times of the old produce in the cooperative cave of Bize are over. It doesn’t work anymore. It is only used sometimes to stock wine and receive the grapes freshly cut, but the local wine is made in Argeliers. Artists’ exhibitions, like Raoul Cuadrado’s paintings on the inside walls bring life again to that place. By the way, the project of the travelling exhibition for Marcellin Albert’s centenary was born there.