Four mobile pieces
linked to a measuring tool connected to a tree
created in collaboration with Guillaume Hutzler
leguinos, tufted carpets, steel.

A scientist at INRAe PIAF, the laboratory with which Karine Bonneval has been collaborating since 2018, has developed a non-intrusive tool that measures in real time the variations in dilation of a branch: the Pépipiaf. Minute by minute, the tree gives us its reactions to the weather, the time of day and the season. These measurements give us the “pulse” of the tree in its own temporality, slower than that of humans. They tell us its circadian rhythm, the way it grows and reacts to the elements. Pépipiaf can also measure wind speed, soil humidity and solar radiation in the tree's immediate environment.
Using the data transmitted by the Pépipiaf, Karine Bonneval creates four installations based on the elements earth, water, air and light. These installations, a kind of costume, are to be experienced physically, by curling up in them, putting them on and putting them on. You'll be able to feel the variations of the tree as a function of light, wind, hygrometry and circadian rhythms. Above all, it's a slow wood factory that makes this data perceptible to our sensibilities, in a permanent vibration, in opposition to our way of seeing trees. We think of them as stable and almost immutable, whereas they are fragile and sensitive, in constant palpitation. The four creations allow us to feel these vibrations, to enter into communion with this breath, to breathe in concert with the connected tree.

Pieces created in residence at IBGBI, University of Evry