calendario eventi  :: 

X

1/7/2014

Four exhibitions

Centre Pompidou, Paris

MAGICIENS DE LA TERRE
A LOOK BACK AT A LEGENDARY EXHIBITION

“Magiciens de la terre“, presented simultaneously at the Centre Pompidou and the Grande Halle de la Villette in 1989, was one of the exhibitions that revolutionised the 20th century international art scene.

To celebrate the 25th anniversary of this pioneering event, the Centre Pompidou is staging an international symposium at the end of March, presenting a documentary exhibition in earlyJuly, laying on a summer university, and publishing a new reference book.

At the very beginning of a globalisation not yet acknowledged as such, through its unprecedented invitation to contemporary artists from every continent, sometimes from “invisible cultures“ (Africa, Asia and Oceania), the 1989 exhibition “Magiciens de la terre“, devised by Jean-Hubert Martin, can now be seen as a seminal moment in the globalising of contemporary art.

Alain Seban, President of the Centre Pompidou, wanted to really celebrate this 25th anniversary, which also echoes the theme central to the Centre Pompidou’s thinking and action : “Art is global. Our collection aims to be universal, and should reflect the new geography of creation. This is a major challenge for a contemporary art museum in the 21st century. The exhibition Magiciens de la terre was the first event pointing the way to this globalisation, this new mission. Paying tribute to the exhibition is also a way of highlighting the Centre Pompidou’s commitment in this respect“.

At the same time as celebrations for this pioneering exhibition, the presentation of the Centre Pompidou’s contemporary collections, “Une histoire. Art, architecture et design, de 1980 à aujourd’hui“, opening on 2 July 2014, takes up the challenge of a globalised art scene. Meanwhile since the autumn of 2013, “Modernités Plurielles 1905 – 1970“, the new display of the historic collections, has been offering a fresh reading of the history of modern art, through the works of over 400 artists, representing 47 countries, in all fields of creation.

Various events are being staged by the Centre Pompidou for the 25th anniversary of “Magiciens de la terre“, with Annie Cohen-Solal as general curator:

- An international symposium will be taking place on 27 and 28 March in the Grande Salle, looking back over the experience provided by the exhibition and the prospects it opened out. A number of major international figures have responded to the Centre Pompidou’s invitation to discuss the question of globalisation in terms of economics, sociology, the political sciences and the history of art.

- A documentary exhibition, 2 July – 8 September, curated by Didier Schulmann, head of the Bibliothèque Kandinsky in the Musée National d’Art Moderne, will be presenting the archives of “Magiciens de la terre 1989“ : a large collection of photographic documents, travel diaries, drawings, catalogues and films in an original staging designed by the artist Sarkis.

- A summer university, from 1 to 10 July, open to PhD students, PhD graduates and curators, will enable a new generation of researchers to explore the sources of this exhibition and meet creators, artists and curators, together with archivists and librarians.

A new book co-published by the Editions Centre Pompidou and the Editions Xavier Barral will trace the origins of this event and provide a critical assessment, while looking ahead to the future and further prospects through the writings of sociologists, historians, curators and art critics. Many of the artists who took part in the 1989 exhibition will also provide their current views, and a completely new photo report will take readers back to the 1989 exhibition rooms.

This book is part of the series begun in 2010, with publications on the exhibitions “Dada“ and “Daniel Buren. Le musée qui n’existait pas“.

Lastly, all the «Magiciens de la terre“ archives will be made available to a broad public through a large-scale digitisation programme, going online on the virtual Centre Pompidou, the centre’s new website : www.centrepompidou.fr.

CURATORSHIP
Annie Cohen-Solal
General Curator

Jean-Hubert Martin
General Curator
of “Magiciens de la terre“, 1989

Exhibition
Didier Schulmann
Curator, Head of the Bibliothèque
Kandinsky,
Musée National d’Art Moderne

Stéphanie Rivoire
Head of the Bibliothèque Kandinsky
archives department

Laurence Fontaine
Architect/Stage Designer

Claire Blanchon
Production Manager
Symposium

Jean-Pierre Criqui
Cultural Development Department

William Chamay
Cultural Development Department

Elia Biezunski
Policy officer

---

A HISTORY.
ART, ARCHITECTURE, DESIGN
FROM THE 1980S UNTIL TODAY

A History. Art, architecture, design from the 1980s until today, a new presentation of the contemporary collections of the Centre Pompidou, provides an overview of contemporary art since the Eighties through a circuit of almost 400 works and objects by nearly 200 artists, architects and designers. With paintings, sculptures, installations, videos, films, drawings, photographs, architecture and design, this new presentation offers a new approach to the art of the last thirty years.

1989 marked a break with the past and the start of a new era. The fall of the Berlin Wall toppled divisions in the world of European art, while the events of Tiananmen Square focused attention on a new China. In the eyes of West, new artistic territories emerged, while artists burst upon the international scene and contemporary art biennials sprang up all over the world. The new presentation of the Centre Pompidou contemporary collections focuses particularly on this altered geography, notably the former Eastern Europe, China, Lebanon and various Middle Eastern countries, India, Africa and Latin America.

At the same time the number of artists, galleries and exhibition curators rose considerably, while art became the focus of a new cultural «consumerism». The curator replaced the art critic. The contemporary art market rocketed, and media coverage furthered the democratisation of contemporary art. From an artistic point of view, the arrival of virtual realities, the Internet and the digital represents another turning point, making the definition of a «light-revealed» photograph or the autonomy of certain media like film or video almost obsolete. Sound has become an intergrate part of installations. The practice of performance is attracting fresh interest, with a movement towards dance, theatre and the spoken text. Meanwhile, history of art is also the subject of numerous interpretations, some foretelling the end of history or the move into a post-historic era. New approaches propose a non-linear history, horizontal rather than vertical, which embrace local micro-histories and open up a considerable field for research while questions of identity also provide key material for debate.

In this worldwide environment of seething excitement, artists react to the phenomenon of globalisation and these new realities with an often critical eye, reinventing their practices in line with the upheavals of a constantly changing world where numerous political and social questions have emerged.

Many of them have also reinvented their practices with a new approach to their very «forms of life» and their position as artists, exploring human and natural sciences as well as literature.

The Nineties also saw the emergence of the artist as producer, historian, archivist or documentarist, in a reaction to contemporary socio-political upheavals. The relationship with the body has also led to numerous visual inventions, while many artists see themselves as narrators or autobiographers, creating fictions based on their private lives. Reality itself and everyday objects inspire numerous sculptures and installations, instilling a new poetry into the ordinary, and creating new links between the public and private spheres, themselves subjected to profound sociological upheavals.

A History, a new presentation of the Centre Pompidou contemporary collections, proposes an interpretation of art inspired by the very way in which artists have positioned themselves in relation to these profound changes.

CURATOR
Christine Macel
Curator in chief at musée national d’art moderne, head of the service création contemporaine et prospective assisted by Micha Schischke, curatorial assistant at musée national d’art moderne, service création contemporaine et prospective
Keith Cheng and Mathieu Vahanian, collections managers at musée national d’art moderne
In collaboration with Clément Chéroux, curator and head of cabinet photographique du musée national d’art moderne
Michel Gauthier, curator at musée national d’art moderne, service des collections contemporaines
Emma Lavigne, curator at musée national d’art moderne, service création contemporaine et prospective
Philippe-Alain Michaud, curator and head of the service de cinéma expérimental du musée national d’art moderne and le Service Nouveaux Médias
Curators of the architecture and design sections
Frédéric Migayrou, deputy director at musée national d’art moderne, curator at service des collections architecture et design
Aurélien Lemonier, curator at musée national d’art moderne, service architecture
Cloé Pitiot, curator at musée national d’art moderne, service design

---

Man Ray, Picabia et la revue « Littérature » (1922-1924)

The exhibition "Man Ray, Picabia et la revue Littérature (1922-1924)" sheds light on a crucial period in the history of modern art, between the end of the Dadaist movement and the advent of Surrealism, and is based on the twenty-six covers designed by Francis Picabia for the review Littérature in the early Twenties. Until very recently, only their printed version was known. In 2008, Francis Picabia's original drawings, fifteen of which has never been exhibited, were revealed by the 1900-2000 Gallery, to which Aube Elléouët-Breton had entrusted the works, which had been discovered in an envelope. Thanks to support from Sanofi, the sponsor for the acquisition, this extraordinary set has now entered the Centre Pompidou collections, and is unveiled to the public for the first time. This exhibition also highlights the contribution of Man Ray. The American photographer had moved to Paris in 1921, and Littérature was where he first disclosed images that have become icons of photographic modernity, like Le Violon d’Ingres and Marcel Duchamp's L'Élevage de poussière. The inside pages of Littérature also contained works by Picasso, Max Ernst and Robert Desnos.

In 1922, André Breton remained the only one in charge of the review, after the departure of Louis Aragon and then Philippe Soupault, with whom he had founded it in 1919. To mark the review's change of direction, Breton decided to replace the cover image created by Man Ray with drawings – different each time – by Francis Picabia, to whom he gave carte blanche for each issue. In the artist's career, these drawings came between the mechanomorphic works and the Espagnoles. Their highly linear graphic style was Picabia's ironic response to the vogue of the "return to Ingres" advocated by the former Cubists, whom he regularly mocked. Several covers can thus be compared with the world of the master of Montauban – for example, his irreverent interpretation of the Bain turc. Picabia also drew on religious imagery, erotic iconography, and the iconography of games of chance. These ink drawings also reveal Picabia as an animal artist, as horses, baboons, tigers, dogs and deer, probably inspired by books for laymen, rub shoulders with various figures from the world of the circus or the musical. Several drawings seem to be of the authors of the review itself, to which Picabia made a regular literary contribution. The artist made play with pronounced contrasts of black and white, reminiscent of his "Ripolin" paintings of the same period, like the Dresseur d’animaux, now in the Centre Pompidou, which has similar iconography.

Curator : Mnam/Cci, Christian Briend, Clément Chéroux

---

LILI REYNAUD DEWAR AT THE CENTRE POMPIDOU
PRESENTATION OF THE PRIX FONDATION D’ENTREPRISE RICARD 2013

The series of three videos entitled I’m intact and I don’t care (2013) by Lili Reynaud Dewar, winner of the 2013 Prix Fondation d’entreprise Ricard, now joins the Centre Pompidou collection and will be presented to the public as part of the new display of contemporary works from the collections, Une Histoire. Art, architecture et design, de 1980 à nos jours, starting on 2 July 2014. In 2000, the Centre Pompidou began hosting the annual Prix Fondation d’entreprise Ricard, which acclaims an emerging artist in the young French scene.

Works by the prize winners, donated to the Centre Pompidou by the Fondation d’entreprise Ricard, thus add significantly to the collections. Lili Reynaud Dewar’s I’m intact and I don’t care (2013) now joins works by winners of the Prize between 1999 and 2012: Didier Marcel, Natacha Lesueur, Tatiana Trouvé, Boris Achour, Matthieu Laurette, Mircea Cantor, Loris Gréaud, Vincent Lamouroux, Christophe Berdaguer and Marie Péjus, Raphaël Zarka, Ida Tursic and Wilfried Mille, Isabelle Cornaro and Benoît Maire, Adrien Missika and Katinka Bock.

In 2009, the Centre Pompidou acquired one of the artist’s sculptures, Les garçons sauvages (2008), inspired by William Burroughs’ story The Wild Boys, which was presented during the Elles@centrepompidou exhibition in 2009/2010.

After completing a Master’s in Law, Lili Reynaud Dewar (b. 1975 in La Rochelle) studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Nantes (1998-2001 and 2004-2005) and the Glasgow School of Art (2001-2003). After settling in Nantes, she became an active figure in the local art scene, and contributed to the review 02 as an art critic – an activity she continued in co-directing Pétunia, a feminist contemporary art review created in 2009. Numerous national institutions have dedicated solo exhibitions to her, like the Basel Kunsthalle (2010), the Bielefeld Kunstverein (2011) and the Belvedere in Vienna (2013).

Lili Reynaud Dewar creates hybrid works halfway between installation, decoration, performance and sculpture, where she reworks numerous sources from so-called alternative cultures – Black, Rasta, Punk, and Feminist. In these works, she pays tribute to artists like Rainer Werner Fassbinder, the Memphis Group and Josephine Baker.

The performance aspect, often filmed, is important in her work, and actively underlies her thinking, according to her motto: “I perform myself, therefore I become what I perform”.

Since the exhibition Ceci est ma maison/This is my place at Le Magasin in Grenoble in 2012, the artist has created and developed a set-up of evolving elements with fountain beds: beds containing a black ink fountain, with wallpaper or panels covered with flowered fabric and colourful fruit, symbolising intimate spaces and thus composing “bedrooms within a public area”. Variations of this set-up were exhibited during the last Lyon Biennial (2013) and at the exhibition La vie matérielle at the Fondation d’entreprise Ricard in 2013 – a title taken from the eponymous work by Marguerite Duras in which she writes about domestic life.

Lili Reynaud Dewar compares the exhibition period of this set-up as a kind of precarious lease, and imagines what it is like to live in each of these spaces.

In some areas of the exhibition, unseen by the viewers, Lili Reynaud Dewar has filmed herself pretending to live there, dancing nude in Josephine Baker style. The three videos in the series entitled I’m intact and I don’t care 1, 2 and 3 (2013) illustrate her first performances and solitary dances in various rooms in museums – respectively the Vienna Belvedere, the Contemporary Art Museum in Lyon and the Consortium in Dijon. These are all tributes by the artist to Josephine Baker, the Afro-American and Amerindian dancer who used her considerable popularity in the fight against racism. Lili Reynaud Dewar also makes reference to Josephine Baker’s commission for a house from the architect Adolf Loos, the «Josephine Baker House» – which was never built, because it did not fulfil the artist’s need for privacy.

Through her filmed performances, Lili Reynaud Dewar explores the dividing line between what is public/private and what we make public, and the idea of making art a way of living.

CURATOR
Emma Lavigne, curator at the musée national d’art moderne, service création contemporaine et prospective

Image: Samuel Fosso, La femme américaine libérée des années 70, 1997. From the series Tati Print, 101 x 101 cm. Musée national d’art moderne, Centre Pompidou, Paris © Centre Pompidou, mnam/cci, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / Philippe Migeat © Fosso Samuel, courtesy JM Patras/Paris

direction de la communication
et des partenariats
75191 Paris cedex 04
director
Benoît Parayre
telephone
00 33 (0)1 44 78 12 87
email
benoit.parayre@centrepompidou.fr

press officer
Dorothée Mireux
telephone
00 33 (0)1 44 78 46 60
e-mail
dorothee.mireux@centrepompidou.fr

assisted by
Stella Wauthier
telephone
00 33 (0)1 47 48 12 49
e-mail
stella.wauthier@centrepompidou.fr

press attaché
Anne-Marie Pereira
telephone
00 33 (0)1 44 78 40 69
email
anne-marie.pereira@centrepompidou.fr

Centre Pompidou
75191 Paris cedex 04
Opening times
The exhibition is open from 11.00 am
to 9.00 pm every day except Tuesdays and 1 May 2014
Prices
€11 - €13, depending on the period
Reduced price: €9 - €10
Valid the same day for the Musée National d’Art Moderne and all exhibitions
Free admission for Centre Pompidou members (annual Pass holders)

stampa

permanent link