2026 Season at LeCyclop by Jean Tinguely in Milly-la-Forêt
Is freedom an impossible dream?
The artistic programme that has been developed for the 2026 season at Le Cyclop encourages questions about the fragility of the freedom of expression, its power as a form of protest but also its illusory universality.
Through a range of means of expression—digital, monumental drawing, performance, video, and music—the guest artists weave a sensitive dialogue, vacillating between resistance, creation, and censorship.
Léna Turist is a recent graduate from the Art School in Aix-en-Provence (ESAAIX). She invites the public to create flags, textile fragments of multiple identities, which are then carried in a collective performance. These banners, sewn by voice and hand, move from the issue of expression towards collective creation, where freedom is a shared, ephemeral but vibrant experience.
To supply the flags needed for these performative events, the artist will conduct a series of workshops, open to all age groups, and will guide participants in a procession through the town of Milly-la-Forêt and around LeCyclop.
The Russian collective Куда Бегут Собаки (Where dogs run) are an important figure in the world of contemporary digital art. Here, they continue their exploration into the medium through immersive works that subvert technological tools of control, transforming them instead into instruments of emancipation. Their installations are inspired from surveillance methods and seek the invisible boundaries of free speech in a world saturated with algorithms and political power. Their poetic and critical universe evokes a territory where freedom can only exist through code, pixels, and fiction. Natalia Grekhova, Olga Inozemtseva, and Alexey Korzukhin are currently exiled in Ljubljana, Slovenia, as they are openly opposed to Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine, to political repression in Russia, and to all forms of nationalism.
The screening of Niki de Saint Phalle’s film A Dream Longer than the Night adds both a mythological and feminist dimension to this programme. Here, we see an artist confronting the violence of the world through a form of visual poetry that makes the imagination a refuge against domination. Le Cyclop is partnering with the Ciné-Club of the Sismique Association in Milly-la-Forêt in order to promote this film from 1976, which was remastered in 2025. The setting for the film is none other than Le Cyclop and the surrounding villages. A screening and discussion will be held in April 2026 in the new arthouse cinema in Milly-la-Forêt.
Quentin Spohn displays meticulous drawings, rich in symbols, across immense tarpaulins. Between caricature and fresco, his compositions show the tensions that can exist between collective ideals and authoritarian abuses. His quasi-obsessive graphic approach becomes an act of resistance, an attempt to endow drawing with the political power of a mural. Larry Rivers’s Tribute to May '68, an explicitly political piece that can be seen within Le Cyclop served as the inspiration for his work. In other words, this is a tribute to a tribute that resonates with contemporary questions about the excesses of an increasingly authoritarian government, and the growing number of demonstrations that have little impact today.
Anchan is a Slovakian artist and a prominent figure of post-Soviet feminism and queerness. Through their video work, they/them introduces an intimate but political voice. Their creations explore the margins, bodies in resistance, and marginalized identities, reminding us that freedom of expression is an ongoing struggle against erasure and oblivion. Today, the artist lives in exile in the Czech Republic as the Slovakian government no longer allows they/them to express themselves freely.
Last but not least, a memorable sound and light performance is the final offering of our eclectic cultural programme. Armed with an electric guitar, Nina Garcia merges with a percussive light display designedby Christophe Cardoen, a tap dance on metal and mirrors by Anna Gaïotti, and a drum kit by Romain Simon, all set to a clever sound and light design by Étienne Foyer. This raw and energetic performance is filled with saturated, improvised sounds, the metaphor for a voice that refuses to be silenced, an artistic gesture that struggles amidst the cacophony of the world.
Art has the power to allow people to reconnect with themselves, to focus, to continue using their own imagination, to stimulate their thinking. Through images, sounds, and gestures, the cultural programme on offer at Le Cyclop asks a question without a definitive answer:
Does freedom of expression truly exist, or is it simply a mirage that art tirelessly strives to pursue?
Cultural programme:
Lectures (in French)
Andreï Erofeev, L’art contemporain russe d’Eltsine à Poutine (Contemporary Russian art from Yeltsin to Putin)
Isabelle Ewig, Les Merzbau de Kurt Schwitters fleurissent à l’ombre (Kurt Schwitters’ Merzbau flowers in the shade)
Catherine Francblin, Niki de Saint Phalle, un héros au féminin (Niki de Saint Phalle, a female hero)
Léa Levasseur, Yves Klein et l’attrait du vide (Yves Klein and the attraction of the void)
Art workshops (in French)
Jérôme Poret,
Mouler démouler, une manière de sculpter (Moulding and unmoulding: a way of sculpting)
A revival of Rico Weber’s Recumbents
Laurence De Leersnyder,
Cyanotype workshop, photographic prints
Léna Turist,
Expressing & Protesting, creation of flags and slogans for a performance scheduled for 19 September. Workshops are programmed with Milly-la-Forêt residents and local associations as part of the artist’s residency.
Programme dates:
Exhibition
Léna Turist
Where dogs run: Natalia Grekhova, Olga Inozemtseva & Alexey Korzukhin
Quentin Spohn
4 April ->1 Nov.
Screening
Where dogs run
4 April 4 -> 28 June
Offsite screening
Niki de Saint Phalle
16 April – 8.30pm
Un Rêve plus long que la nuit (A Dream Longer than the Night)
Offsite at Ciné-Lines in Milly-la-Forêt
Performance
Nina Garcia, Christophe Cardoen, Étienne Foyer, Anna Gaïotti, Romain Simon,
23 May - 9.30pm
Screenings
Anchan
5 Sept. -> 1 Nov.
Performance
Léna Turist
19 Sept. - 3.30pm
Screening
Louise Faure & Anne Julien
4 July -> 30 Aug.
Le Monstre dans la forêt, Documentary film on Le Cyclop
(The Monster in the Forest)