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We may think we know everything about hair. It seems to be very much alive, sensitive to our moods or the vagaries of the weather. And yet the part of it we see, the fibre, is a material which is biologically dead. It is under the epidermis, in the root, that the vibrant life is going on, where the hair is made as the result of complex and ceaseless chemical and biological reactions., initiated at the very start of embryonic life.
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Within every head of hair, each hair grows, falls and grows again, quite independently from its neighbour. Despite differences in speed of growth, all the hair in the world follows this timeless cycle which seems capable of reproducing itself many times over. However, very often this fine system of constantly regenerated life becomes seized up - so that little by little hair loss increase, the hair becomes rarer and finishes by disappearing altogether.
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All producers of hair care products now make a priority out of ensuring that hair preserves its natural appearance. Determination that reveals implicit recognition of natural hair's great beauty.
However, if there are only two aspects of its appearance which can be appreciated - hair colour and hair form - this simplicity is the result of an amazingly complex process involving the very construction of the hair itself.
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Once it has been constructed, the hair receives no further help from the tissues that created it. Only its incredible conception and the contribution made by cosmetics cares enable it to resist the the many aggressions it is subject to. ). So, for the sake of hair, and in order to know it better and improve the protection it deserves, researchers have developed strange machines to carry out their studies.
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Strangely, hair's properties and structure seem to make it an ideal material for undergoing an infinite number of changes in hair color and hair form and a means whereby we can communicate so much to ourselves and to others.
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Whereas the hair has always been the focus of all kinds of attention, beliefs and traditions throughout the world, this phenomenon once considered to be 'a type of plant growing on the head', remained overlooked by science for far too long. But all that has changed. Driven by the efforts of major groups like L'Oréal,hair has been studied in laboratories and day by day, often after very long periods of research, a whole wealth of fascinating discoveries and inventions are being introduced.
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As has always been the case in every country since history began, hair still possesses powerful symbolic and evocative properties. An object of traditions and beliefs, a sign with hierarchical, religious or mystical significance, it also indicates an established order or a refusal to comply with one. In addition, it is a means of projecting the image we have of ourselves and in fact plays a multiplicity of roles. It is not therefore by chance that hair has taken such an important place in everyday language.
This cultural profusion gives us the urge to set off on voyage of discovery.
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So familiar and so surprising, so simple in appearance and yet the object of such advanced scientific and technological research. Seen from the standpoint of history, art and language, the hair is the focus of an itinerant exhibition realised in partnership with the Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie. After Mexico and Hong Kong, the exhibition named "Decoding Hair" will be at the China Science & Technology Museum, in Beijing, on june of 2005.
By using often innovative technology, the visitor to the exhibition simultaneously becomes a spectator, a researcher or a player. Intrigued, amused, surprised, and always being incited to find out more, visitors are invited to marvel as they become aware of the scientific complexity. Hidden within the apparently insignificant hair, and the enormous amount of research that goes into developing a hair care product.
The various cultural aspects of hair are of course not overlooked so that, in the end, 'Decoding Hair' is a real scientific, aesthetic, historical, geographical and social voyage of discovery.
During this voyage, visitors will discover, among other things, a sculpture one metre in diameter representing a hair enlarged 10,000 times, enabling them to admire the hair's structure in all its detail.
After having discovered for themselves what a weight of 3 kilos means, they will then become aware of the hair's resistance by observing that a strand of 200 hairs is easily capable of withstanding this weight. Looking through a microscope magnifying hair 400 times, visitors will have the opportunity of becoming researchers in their own right, by comparing hair of different colours and ethnic origins.
After which, they simply have to sit in an armchair for a particularly remarkable experience - seeing their own hair enlarged 1,000 times via a video microscope built into the chair's head rest. Quite a surprise to discover something you see every day but have never seen at such close quarters!
The use of a technique usually employed to study hair loss will enable visitors to observe the surface of one square centimetre of hair growing at an accelerated rate. They will thereby understand that growth follows a certain cycle and that the speed of growth differs according to the person's ethnic origins.
Then, by means of an 'audio wig', they will be able to go on a journey of sound through the songs, operas or poems which have evoked hair.
Complemented by a demonstration of how the word 'hair' is used in a variety of ways - many of them contradictory - in all languages spoken throughout the world.
Historical or contemporary objects produced for hair or out of hair will surprise and amuse visitors - or perhaps evoke memories and emotions for them.
If they so wish, visitors will also be able to experience a virtual change in hairstyle for a moment by means of a camera connected to a computer. This will give them the chance of choosing from 40 different styles, and seeing themselves with hair as worn in a previous century, a distant country or styled by one of the greatest hair stylists of today.
Since Mexico, two new components have been added to the exhibition : Hair Profiler, an interactive game in which the visitor must find a thief using clues revealed by hair analysis, Hair 3D, a module based on real time three dimensional imaging to offer interactive journeys deep into a human hair. And in Hong Kong, a Hair Quiz that lets the visitor put his or her hair knowledge to the test.
The next stage of this itinerary is the China Science and Technology Museum at Beijing in June 2005
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