LE GÉNIE DE LA BASTILLE - Art Gallery (Paris). Exhibition of the photomontages Opus musaicum as part of the collective exhibition Le Génie des Minis from December 10 to 22, 2024.
Opening of the exhibition on December 12, 2024.

Opus Musaicum includes several montages of digitally edited images and forms part of a project involving electroacoustic music, abstract animated video and montages of still images, which will work as an animated sonic and visual mosaic. 
The title creates a bridge between musical creation and mosaic work. Indeed, the terms "mosaic" and "music" share the same Latin etymology. And the term "opus" refers both to the various mosaic techniques and to musical works formerly categorised as numbered opuses.
 
During a three-month stay at the CENTRO TEDESCO in Venice, as part of a research grant from the BUNDESREGIERUNG FÜR KULTUR UND MEDIEN, I made a large number of recordings, photographs and videos. I incorporated some videos of the undulatory reflections of buildings in the water have into the animated video (a)utom@ton.
Once the video (a)utom@ton was complete, I took screenshots which I digitally edited and organised into montages of four, six or sixteen images. 
 
Each montage proposes varying configurations of the assembled miniatures, thus evoking various mosaic techniques, such as opus reticulatum (a reticular mesh of tiny fragments) or opus incertum (an assembling of very tiny fragments whose shapes and dimensions are cut irregularly with a random layout).
 
The approach consists in creating the sensation of a floating space (Venice), of a structure reminiscent of the potentially ephemeral quality of any urban space.
A kind of kaleidoscope with variable geometry emerges, recreating Venice’s fragmentary structure which was built on a mosaic of islands and islets, with an interweaving of canals serving an almost "synaptic" function. 

Animated video: (a)utom@ton by Clara Maïda (10'00, 1920x1080 px); screenshots of specific instants of the video; digital editing of the still images and digital cut of some of the images; montages of 4, 6, or 16 images; printing of the montages on several plexiglas plates. 

Clara Maïda, Decembert 2024