Conference by Nicolas Chachereau - Triennale de Bex & Arts
Description
An inevitable future? Debates around the first oil refinery in Switzerland.
In February 1959, when the press revealed the project to build an oil refinery in Aigle, it was enthusiasm and hope that dominated. The shared horizon was black gold, industrialisation, growth, comfort and motorways. Today, sixty years after its start-up, the factory that was finally built in Collombey-Muraz, about six kilometres from Bex & Arts, is being dismantled. There are other questions on everyone's mind - between deindustrialisation, energy challenges and climate change, what will tomorrow bring? Yet it is misleading to contrast the two periods in this way. In the early 1960s, very soon after it was announced, the refinery project was hotly debated. Why was it contested? And above all, what responses did they receive? In this lecture, the historian Nicolas Chachereau will propose some answers to these questions, based on his research in the archives. By shedding light on the controversies of the past, the aim is to reveal the choices and interests that have led to our current societies being organised entirely around oil, and thus to give us food for thought for the future. NICOLAS CHACHEREAU Nicolas Chachereau has a doctorate in contemporary history, is a research fellow at the University of Lausanne and is a scientific collaborator at the EPFL's Laboratory for the History of Science and Technology.
Practical Information
For all audiences. THE BEX & ARTS TRIENNIAL - This exhibition takes place from 14 May to 24 September 2023. - Open every day from 10 am to 7 pm.
Contacts
Fondation Bex & Arts Rue du Signal 18, 1880 Bex, CH info@bexarts.ch +4179 780 18 80
An inevitable future? Debates around the first oil refinery in Switzerland.
In February 1959, when the press revealed the project to build an oil refinery in Aigle, it was enthusiasm and hope that dominated. The shared horizon was black gold, industrialisation, growth, comfort and motorways. Today, sixty years after its start-up, the factory that was finally built in Collombey-Muraz, about six kilometres from Bex & Arts, is being dismantled. There are other questions on everyone's mind - between deindustrialisation, energy challenges and climate change, what will tomorrow bring? Yet it is misleading to contrast the two periods in this way. In the early 1960s, very soon after it was announced, the refinery project was hotly debated. Why was it contested? And above all, what responses did they receive? In this lecture, the historian Nicolas Chachereau will propose some answers to these questions, based on his research in the archives. By shedding light on the controversies of the past, the aim is to reveal the choices and interests that have led to our current societies being organised entirely around oil, and thus to give us food for thought for the future. NICOLAS CHACHEREAU Nicolas Chachereau has a doctorate in contemporary history, is a research fellow at the University of Lausanne and is a scientific collaborator at the EPFL's Laboratory for the History of Science and Technology.
Practical Information
For all audiences. THE BEX & ARTS TRIENNIAL - This exhibition takes place from 14 May to 24 September 2023. - Open every day from 10 am to 7 pm.
Contacts
Fondation Bex & Arts Rue du Signal 18, 1880 Bex, CH info@bexarts.ch +4179 780 18 80