In residence at the Ateliers de La Madeleine in Arles in 2026, Theo Guicheron Lopez is developing a body of work for the exhibition Là où le sol peut fondre at the Thermes de Constantin. Through his sculptures in black-stained wood, set with fragments of stone and bitumen, the artist traces, across the remains of ancient stone, a sensory landscape for a poetics of the ground.
The work of Theo Guicheron Lopez, an artist and poet, emerges from his sensitive relationship to places. Deeply attached to the city of Arles, the artist spent several months in residence at the Ateliers de La Madeleine between January and June 2026. It was there that he conceived and created a body of work that forms his score for the exhibition Là où le sol peut fondre at the Thermes de Constantin, the remains of ancient Roman baths.
It is the former presence of water within the Thermes de Constantin that interests the artist. Roman civilisation developed a profound cult of water. Today, we have shifted into a petro-culture: we breathe petroleum, we eat it, we wear it; our entire bodily attitude has become a choreography of petroleum. Through his sculptures in black-stained wood, set with fragments of stone and bitumen, the artist opens up perspectives on what it means to be here and draws, across the remains of ancient stone, a sensory landscape that invites a new poetics of the ground.
A contemporary art magazine published by Analogues, Semaine focuses on the development of art and exhibitions in time and proposes an approach to art in the making, revealing the extent and diversity of the artistic territory in France today.
Born in Paris in 1991 and now based in Poland, Theo Guicheron-Lopez is a self-taught artist and writer. His sculptural practice explores our physical and psychological relationships to the ground, with particular attention to the artificial surfaces that shape contemporary life but often go unnoticed.
Working primarily with wood, stone, and metal, Guicheron-Lopez creates installations and sculptures that reveal the contradictions inherent in materials generally perceived as inert or utilitarian. For him, the ground is never neutral: it bears the traces of movement, imagination, and projected desire, making it a site of fantasy, memory, and spatial aspiration.
