ZIM & ZOU, AKA LUCIE
THOMAS AND THIBAULT
ZIMMERMANN
Paper came to us quite naturally. In
fact, Lucie’s grandparents worked in a
paper factory in the Vosges Mountains
in France, so we had access to a lot of
unsold paper reams – a great material
to play with. One day, we just wanted to
have fun, and made a replica of a vintage
Game Boy. The result was quite good,
and most importantly, we really enjoyed
working with the materials. After that,
we tried making another version that
was less realistic, using colours from the
’80s, and that became our signature.
The biggest advantage to working with
paper is that you can find it easily, and
it’s not that expensive when you work on
a small installation. The problems come
with scale. One of the last installations
we made was in Dubai – we were creating
two-metre paper mushrooms. As we
were using lightweight paper sheets,
we had to build an internal structure
that would prevent the artwork from
collapsing! When it comes to having to
move the piece into place, months of
work can disappear in a few minutes.
We have two main techniques for
sculpting paper. The first is very
geometric, clean and neat, using
straight lines and angles; the second
is more organic and freestyle, mostly
used for animals. The tools we use are
quite simple: a ruler, a square, pencils
and a paper cutter – that’s all, really.
Depending on the step we’re up to,
sometimes we need a lot of concentration
and silence, and sometimes we’re more
like robots and listen to music to pass
the time. When we have to do something
repetitive like sticking down hundreds
of feathers or paper fish scales, we
even watch a few documentaries!
Nature is a great source of inspiration for
us, but we also work with very different
themes, like firearms and child soldiers.
Like a lot of artists, we feel the need to
talk about subjects that are important
to us. By now, we know paper and
its specificities quite well – we know
what’s possible and what’s not. Those
real-life constraints shape our work,
which is very exciting. We love to find
our own solutions to a problem.
creative people