Mathilde Lavenne

Due to her work in chemistry, Marie Curie became the first woman Nobel laureate. Curie and her husband took an interest in the parapsychic phenomena of the United States-born spiritualism movement, which looked at methods of communicating with the otherworld. Science and spiritualism were intimately linked during the second half of the 19th century, when numerous inventions like Morse code and photography, as well as the discovery of radioactivity, were harnessed to explore different modified states of matter and consciousness. This was a women-led movement, but women were virtually invisible in science at the time – a narrative not far removed from the issues of our current era. It is this link between science, feminism, and spiritualism that I would like to explore throughout my residency. Naturally, other political struggles and issues may also come into contact during this immersive process.

I hope to be imbued by first-hand encounters; to follow the trail of hidden, invisible, or minoritized narratives; and to gather spoken word and filmed material, all of which will sow the seeds of a future feature film or documentary series.

My project will also draw upon some of my past works, in particular my film Tropics, which I made using a 3D scanner at a former French colony in Mexico. This technique will accompany me throughout my explorations, helping create a phantom memory of these strongly symbolic sites and of narratives from women with unique lived experiences. I will travel from Marfa, on the Mexican border, to the somewhat sleepy city of Corsicana, Texas. The latter is known for its nearby oil wells, first discovered by the African-American clairvoyant Annie Buchanan. I will look at topics ranging from the history of women mediums and scientists to the history of slavery.

Texas, a region steeped in the history of space exploration, presents an opportunity to deepen and develop my research into women in science, in particular astrophysicists. While there, I will delve into the archives of Harvard Computers, where women mapped out the sky and indexed the stars in the Henry Draper Catalogue. Devices such as telescopes, cloud chambers, scanners, and spectroscopic instruments—used to capture images of celestial objects—have been crucial in the discovery of rays that are invisible to the human eye. They may therefore be seen as being associated with the birth of a spectral world.

Fascinated by these phenomena and the narratives surrounding them, I will travel to Houston, and to the McDonald Observatory in the Marfa desert to seek them out. This remote desert location offers a full panorama of physical and astrophysical phenomena. I will explore these phenomena, while supplementing my study with material, sound, and footage samples. A unique opportunity will also come in the form of the total solar eclipse due to occur during my residency.

In addition to documents and footage, I will gather historical research from the spiritualist archives of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, which are held at the Harry Ransom Center, Austin, or from the NASA archives in Houston.

I am particularly keen to find people who have ties to or who have lived through spiritual experiences related to medium practices. I would like to conduct field research through on-site encounters and interviews, which may culminate in video portraits filmed during the residency. In this respect, I know of a Waxahachie bookstore specializing in occultism that may be a worthwhile documentary source.

In the little city of Corsicana, I will investigate the life of Annie Buchanan, the African-American clairvoyant who played an important role in discovering the first Texan oil wells. I also intend to become acquainted with the artistic community of 100 West, a former Freemason lodge turned artists’ hub. There, I will continue my exchanges with residents and further develop my project to scan part of the city in 3D.