Chéri / 1

Chéri has its origins in the etymology of the word erotic. From eros: passionate desire; erotic: pertaining to love; representing its effects, celebrating its delights. In ancient Greece, eros was a force so powerful that it could move a subject toward the desired object: eros, the divine principle that drove those subjugated by it toward the pursuit of absolute beauty. Eros is a word with infinite facets. It is almost always associated with a purely sexual, explicit connotation—yet an element of the sensual, the mysterious, the undefined persists. Chéri begins with the origin of eros and asks: what makes us fall in love? What is erotic about it? What speaks to us of beauty? The search is not directed at human subjects, but rather begins with art and creativity. Love and desire can take different forms: how does art, in all its manifestations, seduce us?