Pauline Julier’s film is set in a mystical, misty landscape that could be Mars or an unknown planet, but it is actually a theater set. Three scientists discuss the challenges of space research, the latest discoveries, and imaginary worlds.
Didier Queloz, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics for the discovery of exoplanets, speaks with Camille Bonvin, a cosmologist, and Violaine Sautter, a planetary geologist and member of NASA’s Curiosity and Perseverance missions. The conversation, centered around a thermos, camping mugs, and a picnic, draws a connection to Ray Bradbury’s short story A Million-Year Picnic (1946), part of his *The Martian Chronicles*: a family must leave Earth and finds its own reflection while searching for Martians.
Even today, the question remains: What do we learn about ourselves when we look at Mars? What kind of life—past or future—are we searching for in space? This film is the result of a collaborative, interdisciplinary creative process that took place at the Théâtre Vidy-Lausanne in 2024.
AFTER THE SCREENING:
Following the screening, there will be a discussion between director Pauline Julier and Eric Vautrin, playwright at the Vidy Theater.
--- Biography of Pauline Julier
Pauline Julier (b. 1981, Geneva) is an artist and filmmaker whose practice explores the connections humans forge with the world around them through stories, rituals, knowledge, and images. Weaving together documentary, theoretical, and fictional elements, her films and installations reflect the complexity of human relationships with their environments and foster a dialogue between science and myth to renew our perspective on the world.
His works have been exhibited at major contemporary art centers, institutions, and festivals around the world, including the Centre Pompidou (Paris), the IAC (Villeurbanne), the Loop Festival (Barcelona), Visions du Réel (Nyon), Wiels (Brussels), the Centre d’Art Contemporain (Geneva), the ZKM (Karlsruhe), Tokyo Wonder Site, the Museum of Modern Art (Tanzania), the Palazzo Grassi (Venice), as well as in New York, Madrid, Berlin, Zagreb, the TIFF Cinematheque (Toronto), and the Pera Museum (Istanbul).
