The commission

The Roubaix-Tourcoing Children's and Family Centre looks after adolescents in emergency situations. The social workers offer the young people a gardening activity in partnership with La Condition Publique, which runs a rooftop garden. The group wanted to commission an artist to promote the transfer of gardening knowledge and innovative agricultural techniques in an urban environment during the period when the garden was closed for renovation works. This "zero-carbon" approach is intended to reflect on global warming and on the ecological habits of each individual.

The artwork

In response to this commission, Philémon Vanorlé proposed a composite work, a mobile horticultural tool for the Patrons: a greenhouse-vehicle dedicated to growing marigolds - Calendula officinalis, a plant with medicinal properties - and equipped with a watering pump for fresh water. After a phase of experimentation with the mobile vehicule, Cataplasme will continue in the form of a film in which teenagers from Roubaix will travel through the Nord department, towards the coast; a journey guided by encounters and the benefits of marigolds. NB. Marigold in French is translated by souci, also the word for worries – the artist plays on the ambiguity of sowing worries in Roubaix…

The artist

Philémon Vanorlé was born in Brussels in 1980 and is of Belgian nationality. His artistic work shows the comical and sometimes touching absurdity of forms, images or vernacular objects gleaned or injected into everyday life. Wordplay, misappropriation, displacement and irreverence characterise a production that is both poetic and critical. With a doctorate in art (Université Paris 1), he works under the name of the Société Volatile and also creates theatre set designs.