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Kaliski, Kevin

My collaboration with Kevin began in December 2010. I was selected to participate in the 56th Salon de Montrouge but I decided not to present my work, and instead offered my exhibition space to Kevin Kaliski, who was 14 years old at the time and passionate about the region’s mining history. In December 2011, Kevin welcomed me to his home, where half of the space in his family’s garage had been converted into a workshop and exhibition space for his collection. This is what he told me about his work: “My grandmother always told me stories her father had told her about his time in the mines. He started at the age of 13, retired when he was 40, and died at the age of 57 from silicosis. I was 6 years old when I started asking my grandmother all sorts of questions. Since I was 8, I’ve collected lots of things: tools, lamps and objects from miners’ everyday life. I have pictures as well, a lot of pictures about the mine. I look for them on the Internet, from miners and in my grandmothers’ old boxes, too. Then I organise them in drawers. I also make drawings of mining rigs and cardboard panels with the pictures. Then I make Lego models of mine pits, particularly one that I started when I was 8 years old and that I’m still working on. Once I find a new object, I put it on my blog [keviin62141.skyrock.com] straight away, which is like a virtual exhibition. [Now] I am a member of The Evin 8, an association dedicated to remembering and preserving mining sites and buildings. We organise outings with the giant lamp lighter Odette, to preserve the memory of all the women who also worked in the mines. My first exhibition was at the 2009 Mine Expo with The Evin 8. I presented my first Lego model. The second exhibition was with you at the Salon de Montrouge. In November 2011, I displayed all my tools and my lamps at the Billy-Montigny Community Centre, during an exhibition for the protection of the engine room of pit 10, which witnessed the Courrières catastrophe in 1906.” YT