L’Arpenteuse

L’arpenteuse is an in situ artistic installation project reflecting on the history of the Palais de l’île and more specifically on its chapel. Subtly playing with the framework, the installation reflects the natural and changing light which passes through the clear stained glass windows of the place.

Convict links echoing the old adjoining prisons, symbolic ceremonial chains or materialized psychological fetters, these 50 meters made of borosilicate (known as pyrex) snake through the heart of the framework restored in 2017.

The work plays on contradictory principles. The visitor perceives the fragility, transparency and elegance of the glass material which opposes the hardness, the hindrance and the violence of the subject, the prisoner’s chain. This perception in two stages activates several links of interpretation: ghostly chain of an ancient enclosed presence, spider web of an ancient monument, the surveyor materializes the layers of history of this place and delicately forces the viewer’s gaze to visit the heights of this symbolic monument of the city.

Visual artist and master glassmaker, Sandrine Isambert (born in 1979) is originally from Haute-Savoie. After studying Applied Arts in Lyon and Plastic Arts in Lorraine, she specialized in the field of glass by co-founding the Fusion Libre workshop with Guillaume Rude (2009-2018). She taught at the Haute école des Arts du Rhin from 2012 to 2014. She regularly participates in workshops, conferences and study sessions around this material: among others, a round table with Matali Crasset organized by the Hotshop in resonance with the Lyon Contemporary Art Biennale (2022) or participation in the Hermès Foundation’s Academy of Expertise (2021-22).His work was selected by the Corning Museum of Glass in New York in 2015 (Review 26) and in 2023 (Review 42).Since 2018, she has lived and worked between Annecy and Geneva. His sculptural work develops a reflection on invisible worlds where the mutation of organisms and landscapes highlights the fragility of our ecosystems. In parallel with her personal work, she leads numerous artistic collaborations with other visual artists including Benoît Billotte and Gwenaëlle de Carbonnières.