clinamen

Soft ringing sounds blend with the quiet hush of the crowd mesmerized by Boursier-Mougenot’s installation at the Bourse de Commerce. Sunlight pours through the glass dome ceiling across the bright blue pool spanning the spacious Rotunda. A slight current propels pristine ceramic bowls of various sizes to swirl gently around the pool, tapping each other lightly and randomly to create a serendipitous melody, composed by the invisible flow.

Giving sound and sight to the encounters between aquatic waves and acoustic vibrations, clinamen takes on a life of its own, proposing endless and unpredictable variations as its name taken from Epicurean physics indicates. Visitors walk, sit, or lie down next to the enchanting pool, sharing the uniqueness of every moment. The installation’s 360° configuration and constant movement, enhanced by the sun’s progression across the sky wafting through the exposition space, invites displacement to experience the work from multiple perspectives. The winding stairwell allows spectators to also admire the work from above, where the multiplication of spinning spheres appears all the more striking. This variation of clinamen, the largest ever in an 18-meter pool, animates reflections of scale, wherein near-imperceptible movements on small objects set into play an orchestration of cause and effect that ripples over a wide expanse affecting larger objects and flooding a 3-story dome with awe.      – A. Street

clinamen a été exposée en plus de vingt itérations dans divers lieux, notamment à la Rotonde de la Bourse de Commerce – Collection Pinault en été 2025, et au Centre Pompidou-Metz en 2015.