It is a vitrine like many others – a jeweler’s, a pharmacist’s, or a souvenir shop’s. It gathers a series of used objects, abandoned by their owners: a perfume bottle with only a few drops left or an old half-empty shampoo bottle. These remnants, sometimes altered by the artist who transforms them into miniature sculptures, are exhibited in vitrines at the Sultana gallery. They form the first art installation by Harry Nuriev presented in Paris.

With Lèche-Vitrines, Harry Nuriev offers perhaps one of his most enlightening installations on his concept of Transformism, the cornerstone of his work for several years. Transformation, in his hands, is above all an alchemy of objects: Harry Nuriev has previously repurposed computer keyboards to create mirror frames and transformed underwear into rugs. The most ordinary and contemporary objects from our lives are reassigned not only to a new use value but also to a new aesthetic and a newfound beauty.

Harry Nuriev, in his own way, performs a genuine re-enchantment of the world, of matter itself, and of the forgotten and abandoned objects that surround us. This alchemical rearrangement of the world is also, and primarily, an act of refusal: a refusal of the relentless production of new objects, a refusal of the contemporary obsession with voracious consumption that depletes materials and exhausts the planet. The endless flow of consumption could thus give way to a world of permanence, where revitalization of what already exists replaces its constant, hysterical replacement.

“What will remain of our world in fifty years?” he asks. “Will we still be able to produce new objects, to extract materials endlessly from the earth? Or will we have to make do with the used objects still available?” In response to this dystopian vision, Harry Nuriev proposes an ascetic and humanist answer: to make do with what remains, to initiate a transformation that is not merely about objects but about our relationship with objects – and therefore with the world.

It should be noted that the perfumes, shampoos, and creams featured in the exhibition come from Harry Nuriev’s friends and close circle. For him, the re-enchantment of the world, its rearrangement, involves celebrating the community. The objects on display in the showcase are no longer mere marketing tools for consumerist exchanges but a celebration of human relationships. A perfume evokes the scent of a loved one; a day cream recalls the skin of a friend. Removed from its condition as a capitalist product, the object can once again embody something human.

Photography © Gregory Copitet