©Les Nivaux, #STOPURGENCE, 2020. Sculpture, 3.20m in diameter on the ground.
STOP let's ask, discuss and think about a possible Reset
Stop Emergency! There is an urgent need to deactivate the runaway of our earth, to slow down and suspend time to reflect on the future, on a new life, a new world, a new ecology, a new way of working, of consuming, of living all together, to take control of our lives.
To do this, the artists imagined a diversion of the EMERGENCY STOP mushroom button, known throughout the world. Disproportionate, it imposes itself in the public space, like a summons to sit down alone or all together, to climb on it like a platform to proclaim a message, to activate it to say STOP let's sit down, discuss and think about a possible RESET.
#STOPURGENCE
©Les Nivaux, participatory installation, sculpture 3.20m in diameter
#STOPURGENCE
Les Nivaux require audience engagement, both physical and digital. The work was exhibited to the public in March 2020 in Montreal, for the Art Souterrain Festival.
PHYSICAL by the action of stopping & sitting.
For artists, it symbolizes the Stop button of our planet earth, to stop its political, diplomatic, climatic, economic runaway... The public is invited to sit down, stand up on the work, appropriate it alone but above all in groups to begin a reflection together.
DIGITAL by the action of delivering a message, a photo, a video on social networks accompanied by #STOPURGENCE. The button as a voice.
“Stop what, who? Speak up and share a photo of yourself on the button or the art work alone. What is the urgency or Your urgency according to you?»
(text engraved on the red upper part)
For this, the artists rely on the public to share on social networks when they are on the installation #StopEmergency. But not only, upstream, they started a #stopurgence campaign by creating pages, accounts, groups on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter. They also broadcast photographic diversions using their Stop Emergency button, this one is staged, sometimes with humor, sometimes with more vehemence and “artivism”.
What if this work initiate a #STOPURGENCE movement?
