Olivier Bodart: Risk Areas

The catalyst to this project is the novel Zones à risques (Éditions Inculte, 2021), by author and visual artist Olivier Bodart. It’s a fictional story comprised of factual natural disasters which occurred around the United States. In the story, Mat, the main character, works as a natural disaster investigator for FEMA. For various reasons, Mat has trouble going to the disaster sites in person. In order to complete his work reports, he decides to create miniature disaster scenes in shadow boxes and do macro photography to obtain images needed for his fake reports (which he passes off to the agency as authentic). Just before completing the final part of the novel, Bodart decided to step into the shoes of the main character, and actualize the shadow box scenes and images which produced the project “Risk Areas.” Unlike the character in the book, he traveled to the four factual disaster sites and collected materials for the project. The undertaking resulted in the creation of 52 shadow boxes and 104 images that is a stand alone visual art exhibition.

Olivier Bodart is a French visual artist and author (novel Zones à risques, 2021) who has lived in North America since 2012. His artworks and novels address issues around climate and environment along with the impact they have on individuals and communities.