Presented as part of the Holding Time exhibition at Andata Ritorno gallery (Geneva, 2024), this series of twelve aluminum pieces covered with retroreflective fabric constitutes a luminous record of the sun’s trajectories within the exhibition space.
Each element stems from a rigorous protocol established by Pauline Cordier: for one year, the artist observed—daily at noon—the projection of sunlight passing through a window of the gallery. The shape and dimensions of this luminous imprint shifted with the seasons, depending on the tilt of the Earth’s axis and the sun’s position in the sky. From these observations emerged twelve “solar indices,” rendered as suspended rectangular forms.
Their surfaces, coated in retroreflective fabric, capture and return light directionally. Depending on the viewer’s position and surrounding light sources, the plaques appear, vanish, or suddenly illuminate, evoking ephemeral windows between inside and outside, between the instantaneous and the cyclical.
