Tania Candiani

Balloon Competition, Lyon 1784, is an installation that was produced during a residence in the south of France, between July and September 2016. This piece is based on specific research on ancient flight technologies that were developed, imagined, and in some cases fortuitously constructed in that region.
One of the findings was an online archive where the drawings and diagrams of various flying artifacts that participated in a balloon race held in Lyon, France, in 1784 are preserved. Each illustration includes annotations of construction, measurements, and instructions so that even when some of these designs have little or nothing to do with the lightness related to the aerodynamic, they begin to be possible because they were once imagined.