Joy Charpentier

Canal Royal - Chagrïn, chagrïn, fay ta malla

Exhibition

From 4 to 27 July

With Canal Royal, all forms of creativity are invited to the Crac, through several projects devised to promote and broaden the reach of the Occitanie region’s art scene. Four projects are presented upstairs at the Crac all summer long.

Chagrïn, chagrïn, fay ta malla is a traditional Sète song written in Occitan language. Joy Charpentier learned it at school after he and his family had decided to settle in Sète. The song evokes the city’s multiple folk roots. Like an incantation, it tolls: “Sorrow, sorrow go away!”

Joy Charpentier is developing research on “traveller” halting sites, particularly the pilgrimage to Saintes-Maries-de-la Mer. As he puts it, he decided to stop in Sète at the same time as the traditional Saint-Pierre festival. At the Crac, Joy Charpentier is presenting an installation that is half-carnivalesque, half-pagan.

He examines gadje representations of his community , between exoticisation and ostracism. As the artist explains, at the centre of the installation, Saint Narvali is presented “as the figure who protects all outsiders, undocumented immigrants, whores, proles, and other Mediterranean queers, like Sara the Black in her crypt of the saints.”

This project received support from Mécènes du Sud Montpellier-Sète-Béziers.