The nymph in the tomato greenhouse, Video still, Hoël Duret, 2017.

Following the first special edition in May 2017, “LA GRANDE OCCASIONE”- Special Edition ofVIDEO SOUND ART, festival and contemporary art production centre – returns to Milanfrom 4th to14th October.The objective isto promote ground-breaking languages and contamination experiences, incentivizing research and new technologies in the arts. Supported byComune di Milano, Regione Lombardia, Fondazione Nuovi Mecenati, and a spe-cial partnership with lnstitut français Milano, the festival will enliven the gallery space of Institut français.After hosting Yuri Ancarani, Ugo La Pietra and Bibi Yamamoto, VSA Special Edition curated by Laura Lamonea, brings the eclectic and visionary French artist HӧelDuret to Milan. Born in1988,Hӧel Du-ret has exhibited his work in the most eminent cultural centres in the world, such as: Centre Pompi-dou, Palais de Tokyo, Palazzo Strozzi, Opéra Garnier – Opérade Paris, Seoul Art Museum, Yishu 8 inBeijing, Martos GaleryinLos Angeles. Hӧel Duret, through a plastic examination that intersects cinema, dance, painting, music, design and architecture, presents a composite installation in Milan, NFT ph<7, a greenhouse composed of ap-proximately 200 plants with an irrigation system-recalls the pictorial tradition of landscape in the con-text of nature now domestic, connected and electrified. The artwork invites the public to witness the spectacle of this particular kind of nature: a manipulated organism in which plants grow distant from terrain and the cultivation develops without soil or sunlight. NFT ph<7, a lively and mechanic organ-ism, is a neutral terrain: neither too basic, nor too acidic its pH speaks with the irony of the theoretical equilibrium of a pure artificial construction. While walking through the installation, a new video shows the awakening of a nymph, who traverse the same scenographic greenery in the crowd ofan electri-fied electronic music festival. The installation, a new series of oil paintings and projections willbe exhibited in the spaces of the Galleria of the lnstitut français Milano. The retrospective dedicated to Duret also presents the self-produced editorial project “I can doany-thing badly”, in addition to a cycle of video projections by the French artist in the Cinema Theatre ofthe lnstitut français Milano. From the setting upof the landscape, to the construction ofan object and modern Makers, the work epitomises the social and aesthetic history ofbricolage that goes through the 21st century London middle class, involving the Arts & Crafts movement, the Bauhaus, and United States Craft Move-ment, until the standardization of tools and counterculture ofDoIt Yourself.Video Sound Art will host, in the perspective of a dialogue with the art exposition and of multidiscipli-nary correspondence, a series of talks held by personalities of the arts, theorists and experts in the relation between art production and landscape, invited to bring their contribution tothis topic and present itto the audience. TALK PROGRAM Institut français Milano Thursday, October 5th, 3 - 7 pm - Galleria Conversation with the artist in Gallerie An opportunity to explore the creative process that led to the realization of the installation. The event is open to the public, a simultaneous translation will help the visitors to discuss with the artist. Friday, October the 6th,7pm - Sala Cinema “The theatrical dimension of the video image” chaired by Mathilde Roman Art historian and critic Mathilde Roman explores the complex relationships between visualsarts andstage practice. Saturday, the 7th October, 7pm - Sala Cinema "Art Industries: the technological future between art, design, fashion and contemporary cul-ture"chaired by Marco Mancuso The new creative social classes, of various formation and extraction, represent an ecosystemnotyet “mapped”by the institutional culture. Often an integral part of the territories and the markets ofthe contemporary Media Art, they are capable of relating the industry toan ecosystem composed byresearch centers, laboratories, hacklabs,academies, exhibition spaces and leading institutes for the application of technology and science to the art practice. The critic and curator Marco Mancuso -founder of Digicult and formany years one of the major experts of the impact of technology and sci-ence on art- defines the capability of the "Art Industries”as the one of acting as catalyst of a more and more “widespread” form of artistic, economic and cultural production. What are the structures ofvalue, expressive languages, the markets, the scholarly and research environments which can trans-form this context into a real productive model. for a new form of culture in between art and industry? Sunday, October the 8th, 6pm - Sala Cinema “Artialisation of landscape in situ in visu - Intersections between landscape architecture and art practices”`chaired by Anna Lambertini The architect and landscaper Anna Lambertini offers a reading of landscape that starts from the sug-gestion given by the philosopher Alain Roger and insist on the ”authentic character of the artistic ac-tivity” and the landscape that it produces. What If life mirrored art and not the contrary? *Date tobe announced*, 7pm - Sala Cinema “The Radicant”chaired by Nicolas Bourriaud Nicolas Bourriaud, famous critic and curator who was also capable of connecting the art world to the general audience, present the third part of the the important journey started with ”Relational Aesthtet-ics”and“Postproduction”, in which he discusses about art history in relation to cultural production and globalization. Free entry. To attend the talks booking is necessary info@videosoundart.com The talks willbein French with simultaneous translation by the Institut français Milano.