Bernard Szajner's 'Back to the Cave' at Galerie Taïss, Paris

Bernard Szajner's exhibition 'Back to the Cave' at Galerie Taïss in Paris (September 4 – October 31, 2009) is an initiatory journey through life stages. Szajner, a 'total' artist known for light scenography and electronic music since the late 1970s, draws on his personal biography—born in a 'cave-cavern.' The gallery, opened a year prior, favors poetic, walk-through exhibitions. The show avoids the risk of substance loss to ambiance. The first section, 'Le temps blanc,' evokes childhood and birth with a terrifying maternal figure: a giant, multiplied black M resembling spider legs forming a doorway. Playful pieces like 'Codex chromatique' (mood-color association) and 'Conte de fée' (red pieces, inarticulate alphabet) recall Dada's spirit (without political implications), op art's optical efficiency, and Symbolist-era sensory correspondences. Adolescence is represented by a chessboard animated with shadows. The most spectacular part, 'Le temps noir' (adulthood), uses new technologies to renew fascination with illusion-creating mechanisms (magic lanterns, automata), expressing life's fundamental uncertainty. The artist's intentions may be deeper than the works show, but the sensory journey is pleasurable. Reviewed by Anne Malherbe.