Mona Cara – Le Cactus, 2024

Working at the intersection of tapestry and comic strips, Mona Cara weaves hybrid textile pieces that transform the chaos of the world into a gleeful apocalypse. In her exploration of the pictorial and sculptural potential of the warp and the weft, she combines manual craftsmanship with industrial techniques such as jacquard weaving, which makes it possible for her to programme complex patterns. With multiple references to pop culture — from Doctor Who to Peppa Pig —, the artist chooses the more amusing, long-way round in tragi-comic pieces that interrogate the dysfunctions of contemporary society.

Drawing her inspiration from the café Le Vola, Mona Cara’s work The Cactus weaves the collective history of a local bistro, a colourful meeting place where lace and jacquard converge in a meeting of unusual personalities and strange chimeras. Amid water towers, weaving looms and telegraph poles, a strange society, both imaginary and real, bustles about. Individuals the artist met at the Hôtel de la Dentelle in Brioude, the Tissages factory in Charlieu and the Salins d’Hyères cross paths. The cheerful, offbeat world of Mona Cara’s textile installation celebrates togetherness despite the socially and environmentally troubled state of the world.

Mona Cara has been in residence in various locations in the Auvergne Rhône-Alpes region during the Lyon Biennale, working with specialised textile artisans, as well as volunteers, to create her imposing artwork. She made the lace at the Visitation Chapel in Brioude with the help of professional and amateur lacemakers from the Hôtel de la Dentelle, and produced the jacquard fabric at the Les Tissages factory in Charlieu. In Lyon, she worked with residents and users of the Guillotière and Moncey-Voltaire neighbourhoods to assemble the various pieces.