Temps de Mars

The Temps de Mars exhibition takes its title from a work by Charles L'Eplattenier dating from 1907. Depicting a Jura summit where the snow seems to have just begun to melt, under a stormy sky, this landscape is the starting point for a reflection on the links between the visual arts and climate change: with its double-entendre title, it associates spring with the planet Mars, the mineralized double of the Earth from which all life seems to have disappeared for the time being, while at the same time encouraging us to project ourselves into other times, long, ancient or future.

Based on a comparison of historical works from the museum's collection and a body of contemporary works, the exhibition explores the alien future of mountain landscapes, especially in the Jura, and their inhabitants (flora and fauna). By taking an interest in landscape painting, we can measure the evolution of modes of representation, as well as that of the habitability of the spaces that artists have historically set themselves the task of representing. Here, art becomes the bearer of testimony to past climatic and landscape conditions. At the same time, art is a tool for speculation, enabling us to consider the future transformations of familiar territories.