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The work of Paris-based visual artist Julien Mauve explores human interaction and conditions of the modern day. His series ‘After Lights Out’ delves into silence, darkness, solitude, and vacuity, making comment on our relationship with artificial light and new technologies.
The world in Julien’s ‘After Lights Out’ is enveloped in near total darkness, with the exception of one lone source of man-made illumination. Julien invites the audience to imagine a world where the uninterrupted blackness of nighttime no longer exists – lampposts now mimic stars and smartphone screens pierce the dark, guiding you home. These singular sources of light amongst a sea of darkness, become “a mystical phenomenon”, as defined by Julien. The unknown narrative behind the lone light evokes an interweaving of anxiety and comfort: are we alone? The enigmatic series ‘After Lights Out’ comments on the significance of light: “In the darkness of space, light is a beacon of hope,” explains Julien. “In a world of black and blue, the single incandescence of a bulb could be the greatest promise of an adventure about to start.”
