Lyon day 3 (and a Daniel Spoerri événement)

Yes, I heard some excellent papers today - and, as ever at big, sprawling, multi-period and multi-expertise conferences, made some mistaken choices ... But, outside of the conference rooms, there were two main highlights.  One was the park opposite the conference center/my hotel - the kind of park that makes one think - yes! Maybe my next project should be on Public Parks of the World - this was truly one of the very best outside of Japan, complete with lots and lots of biodiversity non-mown wildflowers.

not that anyone was boating, but the boats were pretty,

and the boat rental establishment was stunningly Art Nouveau.

And although you probably can't see him in the slightly misty woods, there is, indeed, a man playing the piano here, rather well - one could hear the music wafting out over the lake.

Then this evening, I'd signed up for a Daniel Spoerri - what would one call it? Happening seems a bit outmoded, but - event?  I had no idea what this would be like ... the premise was that one's position at a table, rich or poor, would be determined by the throw of a dice.  You can tell the difference in the table settings, below.

This piece of conceptual art could, of course, go one of two ways.  One way would be that the "poor" got served Big Macs and maybe, if they were lucky, a can or two of Coke, or Red Bull.  But of course it didn't, in fact, work that way.  Whether one was "rich" or "poor" was determined by a shake of the dice/. Looking at the tables, it was obvious that the black bread on the peasant side looked rather good.  So the Event went the other way ... in that the Rich (and yes, I was part of the blaoted bourgeoisie) were served an impeccable nouveau cuisine, beautiful - but rather tiny - meal.  Tbe Poor - well, of course, the lentil stew, and the fish/vegetable mash up, and the cinder coated goats cheese (we had some fancy cheese in cornets, with pickled something or the other) - had the real treat.

Not, in other words, a very subtle lesson.  But happily I was with a very international and fun conglomeration of people - from Denmark, Brazil, Germany ... - and we all shared all our food anyway, and all our wine ...

which was just as well, because when the chef - Jérémy Galvan, who's a real big Michelin chef name here in Lyon, came round and explained the philosophy behind it all (well, duh - not that hard to work out) and that the "Poor" actually had the much better wine ...  There wasn't, malheureusement, actually any sign of Spoerri - other than a short film of his first - but the whole thing was one of the best conference thingies I've ever been to.