Hej svenska land art-konstnärer. Vi skulle vara glada att välkomna dig till Bourges, Europas kulturhuvudstad 2028.
Några konstnärer har redan skickat in sina förslag, som du kan se nedan.
Vi ser fram emot vårt partnerskap, konstnärligt,
The Chapelle-d’Angillon Cultural Association (ACCA) in Centre-Val de Loire region (France) is looking for Swedish artists for its rural Land art project.
The works will be exhibited along a 30-kilometre marked trail in the heart of the Sologne, passing through the village of La Chapelle-d’Angillon, which is already home to Swedish families.
This project will be in line with Bourges European Capital of Culture 2028 and is intended to remain in place for several years.
More information about the ACCA
More information about Bourges 2028
@Konstnärsnänden
A pilgrimage from the ninth to the twenty-first century
Project to digitise the cultural heritage
of La Chapelle-d’Angillon and
development of the green path as land art
« On the paths of biodiversity » The Sente verte” – the green path
Sustainable mobility and cultural discovery
The cultural experience begins on the train. Our film project could be presented on themed cultural trains.
Bourges 2028 will transform stations into green totems, propose projects on trains and night trains and a low-carbon mobility strategy for rural areas and the region.
The sente verte is a walking trail that follows the old Bourges-Sully-sur-Loire railway line. Between Ennordres, la Chapelle-d’Angillon and Ivoy-le-Pré, a land art project will take place in the middle of the remaining spans.
It’s a thirty-kilometre route, perfectly signposted, that will allow walkers to discover the Sologne countryside, as well as its towns and villages.
We are listing the plots of land adjoining the green path from Ennordres to Ivoy-le-Pré so that artists will have places to display their work.
Land Art project on the Sente verte
For the Sente verte, locally produced and eco-designed materials.
A project that stays put.
Inclusive footpath ?
A regenerative place
Contributes to regenerating biodiversity by working on hedges that farmers tend to eradicate.
A tale of biodiversity, a collaboration between partner artists
Bottles de Tristan Chambaud-Héraud
Ceramic artist who has lived and worked in the Dordogne since 2004. He began working with clay at the age of 7 and has never stopped creating with this material.
« Erosion and minerals are two of the highlights of my work as a ceramist. I simply and humbly try to give back to the earth all that it has given me by rediscovering its tones, its texture, its reliefs, its mineral vitrifications, its magma fusions…. Like her, in the hollows of the Coupes, I look for lakes of enamel, starry skies of molten ash and crushed quartz… »
I’ve been working for years on the theme of bottles, in stoneware or porcelain: shape, material, texture…
They are taken away from their usual function to become barrels of various essences that narrow into the neck of a bottle to find the manufactured object. Sometimes they come together to metamorphose into a mineral forest. The eye is invited to wander, to reverie in the forest of bottles, each of which, by its texture and shape, carries its own note within the whole.
Hipée by Marianne Cardon & Aurélien Dupuis
Multi-disciplinary artists, constructors and inventors, Marianne Cardon and Aurélien Dupuis, graduates of ENSCI Les Ateliers and Ecole des Gobelins, have been working together since 2018 to create hybrid objects-installations with a politico-déglingo-décalée vocation to raise awareness of environmental issues and invite playful contemplation. Cataravans (neo-Noah arks that are part catamaran, part caravan), house-work construction sites, Pré-cairn balancing sculptures… These objects of all scales are invested with poetic powers and play on the gravity of the world to enchant it.
Branchée is a multi-faceted work, a bait, a flashy, festive wink at everything that glitters and attracts us from civilisation.
It invites us to stop and take the time to contemplate nature from a poetic, fairytale perspective. This branch, a fantastic creature of light, suspended in mid-air, its thousands of twirling, dancing specks are projected onto the trees around it by the sun’s rays and the wind’s breath.
In the woods, the familiar gives way to the fabulous, the inanimate is set in motion and the magic works, summoning up the marvellous in our childhood tales and emotions. A mirror object in essence, the work reflects as much as it illuminates the natural world around it, revealing all its beauty, and as if guided by its friendly lights, it invites us to venture further into the enchanted forests of our imaginations.
Bell towers by Francis Perreux
Most of the time, these belfries are found on the dwellings of large farms, such as farmhouses, manor houses or the headquarters of a craft industry.
Roof belfries are decorative or ventilation structures, often made of zinc or treated wood, covered in zinc or slate, with a variety of shapes (thimbles, bulbs, resin capitals) and used to decorate, ventilate or enhance the aesthetics of buildings, particularly schools, churches or farm buildings.
The bell towers that can still be seen date from the late 18th century in some cases, but more often from the 19th.
Les Fujak – Land Art
Olivier Huet and Margrit Neuendof are two visual artists working together and also on their own production. Their collaborative creations refer to art the place of human being in nature.
The principle of each intervention is based on a clear understanding of the local context, and refers to different approaches, which concern:
• the inhabited landscape
• the observed landscape
• the virtual or fictional landscape
• the revisited landscape
Since 2006, they create Nature Art, outdoor or indoor installations, in France and also in Europe, South Korea and USA, mainly in the context of artistic residencies.
Art Nature interventions
The work underlines a recurring concern that drives all the projects: what is man’s place in nature, but also what place does he give himself?
The projects and achievements can be broken down into several approaches that are more or less intertwined in each intervention:
- the inhabited landscape: the place of man in nature, the dialogue between culture and nature, and the dialogue between human beings;
- the observed landscape: reading the landscape and ways of encouraging walkers and visitors to look at it differently. How can we catch their eye and guide them?
- the shifted landscape: the register of fiction and the idea that reality is not always what we think it is, or what we are led to believe;
- the reinvented landscape: the part played by feelings and the sensuality of the place; a subjective vision of the site, where poetry, melancholy and reverie have their place.
The Rats Bougrit by Richard Cancel
Little Rats in earthenware fired at 1030 degrees with acrylic paint or glazing, from the imagination of Richard Cancel. These little rats are made of white earthenware and painted. They’re funny characters, brought to life by a precise sense of detail.
They all have their own personality, their own story to tell, and they all help to bring readers closer together.
A story about biodiversity
Suggest a story to be told by Rat Bougrit. Stimulate reflection on biodiversity.
Just imagine… We set off along the path and, right from the start, at the turn of a bench, Rat Bougrit invites us on an adventure to discover the path’s inhabitants… At each viewpoint, an element of passage and vision is incorporated into the vegetation and geology of the micro-landscape. It could be an animal inhabitant or its anthropomorphic home.
For example, at the bend in the hill, we find Rat Bougrit with Mr Badger at his gate. Further on, a bull’s eye in the hedgerows reveals Mr and Mrs Blackbird, sitting together on the ledge, chatting with Rat Bougrit.
And always this idea of reaching out to others. Rat Bougrit has gone out to meet the locals… openness, a path… altruism…
Master hare asks Rat Bougrit what time it is. At an opening they observe a flow of game: badgers, blackbirds, hares, pheasants, foxes, roe deer, wild boar, chickadees or squirrels… We meet them again at the final scene to see the man and woman accompanied by their child…
What’s more, a QR code directing us to a digital book is attached to each built element, where we find the animals questioning the events. The book begins with the story page. The second page contains a quiz on the animal of the moment and information (for the general public).
A progress bar fills up and the results are given either at the end or through an interactive element.
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Metal sculptures by Thierry Millet
Metal sculpture is a technique that has been used around the world since ancient times. These metal works of art will enhance the green path and give it a mineral touch.
Create a life-size metal sculpture of a deer.
The material will be steel with a ‘rusted’ finish.
Who said metal was a cold source?
Thierry Millet argues the opposite. With his affectionate way of modelling the desired object, he unleashes this reputation in each work, creating the coveted object and making it unique. A way of giving the object a ‘soul’? He brings everyday objects such as chairs, tables, consoles, chandeliers and furniture to life, positioning them in a distinctive way without compromising their functionality. Metalspirit, or when the cold of the material offers us all its warmth of being.
Mérovée Dubois hedgehog ringer
This project is rooted in the Berry region, which is characterised by the fragile but persistent presence of hedgerows.
Details of the proposal
The project involves creating a wooden sculpture inspired by the aesthetic codes of traditional farm furniture, as found in the Berrichon bocage: pendulum gates, wooden fences assembled in half-timber, nozzle poles or porticoes decorated with animal or anthropomorphic figures.
Plaited hedges
This sculpture could be accompanied by additional plaited hedge work (or plessage): the plant strands would intertwine with the wooden body, extending the sculptural form into the living world. Plessage is an age-old technique that involves pruning and bending young living trees to weave their trunks. Widely used in the past in bocage landscapes (Cornouaille, Vannetais, Pays de Rennes, Perche, Normandy), this method made it possible to create natural, evolving and durable fences, without recourse to synthetic materials. It requires regular upkeep, with new plessages adding to the thickness of the hedge over time.
Artistic approach
The aim of this project is to shift the way we look at contemporary art by comparing it with utilitarian forms derived from rural use. The work is handmade using old tools restored in my studio in Boisiller. It’s an artistic gesture rooted in the rural gesture, in direct contact with living things – plants, animals – and a sensitive, vernacular aesthetic.
Each hedge and each sculpture is seen as a work in its own right, combining function and aesthetics, memory and presence.
This project is deeply rooted in the Berrichon region, marked by the enduring fragility of its hedgerows. It proposes a symbolic reversal: no longer considering hedges as mere landscape elements, but as entities to be honoured, listened to and cared for. Taking care of the hedgerows as they take care of us, in their role as ecological corridors.
Transmission & participation
This idea could be extended through participatory workshops: wood carving (engraved stakes, ex-voto inspired by local natural forms), making mobile structures, banners, musical instruments or costumes. The project questions our relationship with the landscape – its use, its memory, its evocative power. The bocage network is not just a backdrop: it is a relationship, an ecosystem and a resistance.
The performances envisaged as part of these workshops would be a high point: a celebration of the link between humans and hedgerows, an invitation to move away from a posture of consumption and enter into a dynamic of reciprocity. Traditional dances, accompanied by instruments made during the workshops, could be organised, echoing projects such as Songeuses et sonneurs des haies (Combourg, 2024).
Territorial anchoring & transmission
Involving schools would reinforce this approach of sensitive and historical transmission of the landscape. The project would provide an opportunity to explore rural knowledge and practices that respect ecosystems, emphasising that preserving the bocage does not depend solely on public policy or technical action. It also requires collective, emotional and sensitive attention to our environment.
Collaboration with local associations such as the Thiaulins de lignières, guardians of the rural memory of the Berry region, would be invaluable. Their stories and know-how would enrich the project, resonating with contemporary issues – ecological, social and cultural – particularly in rural areas.
This dialogue between creation and transmission would make the project a collective adventure deeply rooted in the region and looking to the future.
Durability of the work
Durability certification: 15 years.
The artist undertakes to maintain and repair the work in the event of natural deterioration during the 10 years following its installation.
