PULSE OF THE PLANET (2026)
‘PULSE OF THE PLANET’
SALLE MATISSE
MUSÉE D’ART MODERNE PARIS, FRANCE
5 FEBRUARY 2026
Curated by Jessica Castex and Kathy Alliou
SALLE MATISSE
MUSÉE D’ART MODERNE PARIS, FRANCE
5 FEBRUARY 2026
Curated by Jessica Castex and Kathy Alliou
Extending the questions explored in Otobong N’Kanga’s exhibition, the Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris invites Mel O’Callaghan to continue the reflection on the relationships between humanity and the environment.
Mel O’Callaghan, an Australian artist whose practice unfolds between Paris and Sydney, has conceived a day of encounters, exchanges, and workshops devoted to the exploration of living systems and the bond between humans and planet Earth. Laureate of the 2024 Prix Carta Bianca for a project examining the notion of care, the artist proposes a collective meditation on ritual and planetary care. Beginning with the recording of a steady pulse captured in the depths of the ocean—The Pulse of the Planet—the day brings together, around the artist’s works (films, a sound work, and performance), researchers engaged with ecological issues, ecofeminist thinkers, and sound theorists, to address an essential question: what meaning can be given to the Earth’s pulse?
This inquiry runs through the day’s three sessions, devoted respectively to breath, ritual, and vibration. Each moment considers humanity and nature within a relationship of balance and mutual support—a space in which the natural world and human beings coexist in reciprocity, each nourished by the presence and vitality of the other.
Mel O’Callaghan’s artistic practice, fundamentally transdisciplinary, mobilises a wide range of media—film, performance, painting, sculpture, and sound-based installations. Her works share a common thread: modes of collaboration with holders of both academic and non-academic knowledge, including local forms of knowledge, alongside a sustained attention to self-transcendence. They are situated within a dynamic that connects the individual to the collective, and to a broader order of relations. This dynamic is articulated in particular through the creation of contemporary rituals, conceived as performative devices for synchronisation—or unison—between human and non-human agents on a planetary scale.
Performance | In My Hands the Earth Trembles:
Performer: Lisa Myeong-Joo
Cymbals: Kleo Xirou
Assistants: Adamantia Selekou, Leena Barqawi and Camille Braun
Film | All is Life
Mel O’Callaghan, Devidas Gaonkar, Clemens Habicht, Lisa Myeong-Joo & Zeeshan Sharif
Speakers | Pulse
Francis Rocard, Lea Bismuth with Kathy Alliou
Speakers | Ritual
Devidas Gaonkar & Dr. Christine Guillebaud with Jessica Castex
Translator Sanjyot Telang
Breath and Sound workshop
Dr. Sabine Rittner
Special thanks to Annabelle Constant & Massimo Craman with the team at MAM
With support of Carta Bianca, French Australian Cultural Exchange Foundation (FACEF) and The New South Wales Government through Create NSW.