SILLAGES #1 2024-2025 // Prospections, residences, exhibition
Diffusion at festival de l’Estran, Bretagne
SILLAGES #2 2025-2026 // Prospections, residencies, exhibitions
Final diffusion at cneai = coming soon.
The Sillages program brings together artists and institutions from island territories and mainland France in an unprecedented long-term collaboration.
The shared ambition is to provide opportunities for exploration, research, production, dissemination, and visibility in and from these spaces, which are often remote, both physically and in the imagination.
Launched in 2024, the project, punctuated by these meetings, will run until 2027.
The project
The curatorial team and selected artists traveled throughout Brittany, Réunion, and the French Caribbean during prospecting trips and four residencies.
As part of Sillages #1, two prospecting trips were organized: to Réunion in November 2024 and to Martinique in January 2025. This first phase of the project concluded in 2025 with an exhibition of the four artists’ works at the Festival d’art de l’Estran in Brittany.
A third trip will take place as part of Sillages #2 in Guadeloupe in May 2026, with the final presentation of the second part of the project taking place at cneai = in 2027.
The Festival de L’Estran, Le Réseau documents d’artistes, Documents d’artistes Bretagne, Documents d’artistes La Réunion, Finis terrae - Centre d’art insulaire, La Station Culturelle in Fort-de-France, and cneai = Centre d’art have joined forces to explore the art scenes of Réunion, Martinique, and Guadeloupe and to provide tailored support to the selected artists.
The artists were selected by a curatorial team composed of renowned professionals with complementary profiles, embodying a diversity of perspectives. This team, consisting of Elsa Briand, Eline Gourgues, Bérénice Saliou, and Ann Stouvenel, reflects a shared desire to support contemporary artistic endeavors.
Artists
Continuing the work begun in 2025, Sillages #2 aims to extend the visibility and circulation of works created by artists Andreas Kressig, Guy Gabon, Jean-Claude Jolet, and Olivier Crouzel for the Festival de l’Estran.
Jean Claude Jolet is an artist from Réunion. For the past fifteen years, he has been exploring cultural diversity and Creole identity through sculptural installations that question the lingering effects of Réunion’s colonial history.
Guy Gabon is an artist from Guadeloupe. A pioneer of land art in Guadeloupe and Martinique, she creates multifaceted artistic experiments in natural and urban landscapes to highlight the imbalances in our consumer society.
He and she benefited from a creative residency in the Lannion-Trégor area in May 2025, joined by two artists selected through a call for applications :
Olivier Crouzet is a French artist. He develops contextual art combining video projections and in situ interventions that transform spaces into poetic and contemplative forms, questioning a changing world where disappearance and traces become subjects of observation.
Andreas Kressig is a Swiss artist. He develops ephemeral, habitable architectures from assemblages of recycled materials, creating convivial spaces activated by the physical experience of the public.
These four artists weave together a sensitive cartography in which the specificities of each territory reveal universal resonances.
They came together to propose and exhibit contextual works at the Festival de l’Estran in September 2025. A rebroadcast will likely take place at the Station Culturelle in 2026.
Public meetings and cultural mediation
Each program includes opportunities to meet with audiences (residents, schools, cultural professionals), organized in close collaboration with local partners. Four public meetings have been planned for Sillages #2: in L’Île-Saint-Denis, Martinique, Guadeloupe, and Réunion. These events aim to encourage direct mediation between artists, their works, and audiences, while promoting regional roots.
Sillages’ cultural mediation is based on an approach that is sensitive to the specific characteristics of the territories concerned. The narratives, imaginations, and modes of transmission are deeply marked by particular historical, social, and cultural legacies. Thus, mediation will be built through dialogue to promote a better understanding of the artistic and cultural issues in these island contexts.
Partners
Sillages is a project carried out as part of the “Mieux produire / Mieux diffuser” (Better Production / Better Distribution) initiative, renewed in 2025 by the ministry of Culture - Directorate-General for Artistic Creation.
The project is supported by Documents d’artistes La Réunion, La Station Culturelle, Réseau Document d'artistes and cneai =.
Sillages’ partners are the Réseau Documents d'artistes, Lannion-Trégor Communauté, Documents d’artistes Bretagne, Documents d’artistes Caraïbes and Finis Terrae - Centre d'art insulaire.)