When viewers walk into Julien Creuzet’s exhibition at Brown University’s David Winton Bell Gallery, eyes adjust to the dimness of the room as ears are welcomed by the pulsating beats and creolized French lyrics that waft through the speakers.
Exploring histories of colonization, migration, and ecology, the immersive installation is an adaptation of Creuzet’s 2024 Venice Biennale project for the French Pavilion where poetry, dance, music, sculpture, and video bring viewers into a space suspended between past and present.
Inside the gallery, movement through the space is obstructed at every angle: Metal plates cover the floors, sculptures hang and slump, and four suspended screens form a maze-like path. The four-channel video extends the chaos of the space in digital form as human figures and sea creatures shift between shades of ceylon, magenta, and chartreuse. The figures exist on a spectrum of shapes from amorphous to distinct, creating an indiscernible line between the natural and artificial worlds. The exhibition, “Attila cataract your source at the feet of the green peaks will end up in the great sea blue abyss we drowned in the tidal tears of the moon,” is set against the backdrop of the “great sea,” the Atlantic Ocean. Here, Creuzet reminds us that this ocean has historically borne witness to beginnings, endings, discoveries, violence, and trauma—and asks viewers to reflect on its role in colonization and the trafficking of enslaved Africans. For Creuzet, the fascination with waterways is as much historical as it is personal and political. Raised between France and the French Caribbean island of Martinique, Creuzet drew inspiration for his poignant lyrics from writers and philosophers such as Édouard Glissant, whose work focused on the creolization of the Caribbean diaspora.
The weight of Creuzet’s subject matter is almost disguised by the visual and sonic composition of the work. Amid brightly colored vines and swaying nonfigurative shapes resembling animals and divers, a black iPhone with a cracked display appears on the second screen in the gallery. It makes its way from one end to the other before disappearing. I turn and the phone is floating into a screen directly behind me—a blink and I might have missed it.
At first, the iPhone’s intervention baffled me—underwater is usually no place for this device. When I asked the artist about the phone, he explained that upon completing his university studies, he didn’t have a lot of money for tools such as a camera. The only technology readily accessible to him was his phone, which he used to make videos, write poetry, and record songs. Leaning into his dependence on the device, Creuzet regards the phone screen as a mirror—a mirror for ourselves, but also our position in the world.
The phone thus allows for self-exploration. For Creuzet, this interior questioning extends to his production of music, whichhas always been a key part of his artistic practice. Located on the back wall is Attila cataract, your source at the feet, of the green peaks, will end up in the great sea, blue abyss, we drowned, in the tidal tears, of the moon, Poetry (2024), a video on a flat screen that plays lyrics translated into Portuguese, English, and Spanish to accompany the six songs that soundtrack the exhibition. There is a sadness in the voice of the man singing, a melancholia that fills the space as it repeatedly calls out “Attila.” An echoing outcry accompanies lyrics like “Our bones under the water / Our black tidal waves on our skins” and “Look for me beneath the indigo.” These lines reference the forced passage of enslaved individuals across the Atlantic. Though most of the vocals are that of a man’s voice, a woman harmonizing can be heard at the end of some of the songs. The songs are upbeat—like TikTok dance songs—but incorporate rap lyrics and heavy bass drums that vibrate throughout the gallery. In one song, the artist repeatedly uses the word “vessels,” perhaps to foreground the slave ships that crossed the Atlantic from port to port. In one such moment, he says, “I saw vessels,” followed by “León sent boats / To stop them moving forward,” to highlight that the arrival of boats on the shores of Caribbean islands halted progress for the societies existing there and set into motion centuries of colonial violence and displacement.
While most of the art is installed at eye level, shifting one’s gaze to the floor reveals the metal sculptures underfoot. There are, in total, six Corten steel sculptures, all titled Palmistry of Desiring Water (2025) with varying subtitles and recurrent symbols throughout. Creuzet incorporates a plethora of references that harken to movement—both voluntary and involuntary. The silhouette of a migratory heron along with the migrational path of birds in the Americas nods to the forced migration of Africans. In another, the emblem of the Black Star Line—a shipping company founded by Pan-Africanist leader Marcus Garvey to end colonialism and the exploitation of Black people by providing job opportunities and an independent way of transporting goods—is a representation of Black economic success.
Creuzet emphasizes Black embodiment and survival by repeating these motifs, along with depictions of choreography by Katherine Dunham, a renowned Black American choreographer and social activist, in the other steel floor sculptures. In one such iteration located on the right side of the gallery, the artist depicts several acres of New York that are at risk of being submerged by rising sea levels. By including the silhouettes of two dancers performing Dunham’s choreography, Creuzet foregrounds marginalized communities of color that will be most significantly impacted by environmental disrepair, as they hold fewer resources to rebuild their lives. Attention to the environmental crisis extends to the logistical aspects of the exhibition. The Bell’s director of exhibitions and chief curator, Kate Kraczon, stated that the metal sculptures were all made locally in Rhode Island to ensure a minimal carbon footprint in their transportation.
To celebrate the opening of the exhibition, Creuzet, in collaboration with Brazilian choreographer Ana Pi, staged a performance of Algorithm ocean true blood moves (2023). Mounted at the Lindemann Performing Arts Center and performed by dancers from the Ailey School, the piece engages movement that furthers Creuzet’s exploration of African dance and rituals found in the videos on display and draws inspiration from dance videos trending online. The dancers’ bodies undulated to the sounds produced by bélé drummer Boris Percus. Though the performance also included vocalist Malou Beauvoir and dancehall Shatta music by musician Natoxie, the most memorable sounds were the reverberation of Percus’s hand on the batter head, the plastic of jelly sandal shoes hitting the floor, and the heavy breathing from dancers who moved across the stage for almost two hours.
Throughout the performance, the dancers’ movements were framed by large pole sculptures that sat on the perimeter of the black marley floor. Like detritus from the ocean, the poles were adorned with string, plastic, and fabric knotted with messy fringe in shades of white and blue. It wasn’t until the end of the performance, when the dancers split into groups to take turns carrying the sculptures, that the small bells situated at the end of the poles became apparent. As the poles slumped over the shoulders of the dancers, each one rang out with gentle chimes.
After the performance, the poles were installed in the gallery in such a way that they appear to levitate, allowing viewers to contemplate and confront the production of waste to which they contribute and which has, paradoxically, made Creuzet’s practice possible. In the gallery, the poles appear to be weightless—a contrast to their appearance during the performance in which the dancers seemed to struggle with their length, the poles bending and moving in different directions. Their difficulty in attempting to guide them served as a reminder of the oppressive weight of history. We may try to control it, but it will always bend back.
Many discussions of the slave trade center enslavement in the South, yet the North has cities such as Providence that were central to the systems that forcibly moved enslaved people through waterways, ports, and seas. Creuzet’s exhibition challenges viewers to confront legacies of colonization and enslavement on local ground.
“Julien Creuzet: Attila cataract your source at the feet of the green peaks will end up in the great sea blue abyss we drowned in the tidal tears of the moon” is on view at the David Winton Bell Gallery at Brown University through June 1, 2025.
