Lieu d’exposition
/ Exhibition place
Biography
“Mehryl Levisse is a French-Italian artist who holds a master’s degree in Theory and Practice of Contemporary Art and New Media. They live and work between Revin, in the French Ardennes, and Casablanca.
Queer, committed and militant, Mehryl Levisse explores borders, sociological issues and archetypal, discriminatory and oppressive representations of the body. Their work uses motif and ornament in stagings, performances, wallpapers, colourful, meticulous, complex and exuberant costumes… Their installations are immersive and their photographs question, parody society and use the body as if it were an object, a material that can be malleable and adapted to ideas. In 2021, Mehryl Levisse was awarded the DILCRAH grant, (the Interdepartmental Delegate for the Fight Against Racism, Anti-semitism and Anti-LGBT Hatred). The same year, they produced a performance and a film in collaboration with the Opéra National du Rhin, the University of Strasbourg and the National University Library.”
Approach and works on display
La dernière fête (2023)
“In La dernière fête (The Last Party), Mehryl Levisse mixes and revisits different kinds of parties through textiles, decorum and costume. Mehryl Levisse presents here the exhaustion of the bodies, once the party is over: the lights are turned back on, the decorations are taken down, it is a brutal return to reality.
The window display adorned with different light sources presents these different, exhausted, tired bodies. Wearing their most beautiful finery, they offer themselves to the eyes in a final attempt to seduce the passers-by. Streamers litter the floor, left behind once the party is over, they remind us of the fragility of lgbtqia+ bodies in our societies.
In France, lgbtphobic acts increased by 22% in 2021 compared to 2020.
In 2022, homosexuality is punishable (prison, fine, jail) in 75 countries or states in the world.
In 2022, homosexuality is punishable by death in 12 countries or states worldwide. “