Sélest'art 2001 Biennial Transforms French Town with Participatory Art

The Sélest'art 2001 biennial in Sélestat, France, from September 16 to October 21, 2001, curated by Karin Graff, invited thirteen artists to create site-specific works across the town, deliberately avoiding commercial and institutional circuits. A key theme was audience participation: the Cameroonian collective Cercle Kapsiki set up 'Relooking Booths' offering hair and makeup sessions to play with identity; Catie de Balmann posted enlarged signs reading 'Looking for things hard to say' with a collection box; Ilana Iséhayek's 'Cabanes de Sélestat' turned observers into voyeurs. Atelier Joep van Lieshout presented libertarian-inspired solutions for self-sufficiency in food, energy, and waste treatment at the Frac. Florian Tiedje installed a giant fragmented photograph animated by a river's movements. Francisco Ruiz de Infante transformed a grain hall into a clandestine lab with surgical manipulations and a menacing soundtrack. Robert Cahen exhibited 'Tombe (avec les mots)' in a church, featuring luminous words in a slow choreographed fall. The biennial has become an anticipated platform for artistic research, open to the city and public.