The two works “Perpendicular Cinema” and “Flip Dots Mirrors (small version)” are installations using an original device controlled by a slide projector and computer. Images from the slide projector are reflected by mirrors on that original device, from where they are finally projected onto a screen. The visitor can easily see how the shapes, number and movements of each of these mirrors’ parts create unique effects in the visual projections. One may say that the works of Julien MAIRE expose at once the materiality of images, and that of devices that project them.

“Octet Projectors,” a work made up of several small, self-built liquid crystal projectors, is part of the “Low Resolution Cinema” series dating back from 2005. The term “octet,” normally used to describe an ensemble of eight musicians, means “8 bit” in the realm of communications and computer technology. The fact that the resulting images produced with low resolution and small data capacity show surprising qualities in terms of depth and expanse is due to MAIRE’s approach being just as meticulous about his liquid crystal projectors as a photographer is about his negatives.

The artist’s work, deconstructing and reassembling mechanical imaging devices, is a hybrid of artistic practice and research into media archaeology, and may be considered as a true “reinvention of media.”