Light Machine

On March 15, 2016, to celebrate the transformation of its new store “l’Homme” dedicated to menswear, Galeries Lafayette Haussmann inaugurated a new, permanent installation made by Xavier Veilhan called Light Machine (2016). By investing a space that is both public and private, as much a point of sale as a point of passage, the idea of the artist “was to create a piece that would constantly renew itself, both in image and lighting”.
For several years, he has been developing the series of the Light Machines. Enlarged at the scale of the venue, they altogether constitute a work of art, a wall of lights that illuminates the atrium. Contrary to the various screens found in most department stores, the Light Machine is intended to serve not only as a surface for imagery but also as a light source. According to Xavier Veilhan, “its ghostly images come from a space between abstraction and figuration. This allows for a more poetic, dreamlike experience: I seek to revive the field of memory, that of the after-image, identified as soon as it is discovered.”