Pascal Rousson – Memento Mori 2, 2025

My work challenges Modernist ideologies by using popular culture to explore themes of decay, particularly through imagery of cars and smoking. Cars symbolize freedom and danger, an ideal fading amid climate collapse. This tension between desire and mortality reflects in Picabia’s L’Enfant Carburateur and Duchamp’s gasoline imagery, as well as J.G. Ballard’s portrayal of car crashes. The concept of vanitas resonates here, linking personal memories to the aesthetics of death and the seductive design of automobiles—highlighting the explosive power, speed, and allure of destruction.