Vincent Honore'
Nicoletta Lambertucci
Corentin Canesson
Exhibition Assistant
Cedric Fauq
Le Musee d'une nuit (script for leaving traces). The exhibition show the artworks of the artist like Man Ray, Tamara de Lempicka, Nina Beier, Marie Lund, Yto Barrada, Martin Boyce, Enrico David, Michael Dean, Ayan Farah, Bethan Huws, Pierre Huyghe...
curated by
Vincent Honoré
PROPOS D’EUROPE 13
LE MUSÉE D’UNE NUIT (SCRIPT FOR LEAVING TRACES)
FONDATION HIPPOCRÈNE
The
Fondation Hippocrène
invites
DRAF (David Roberts Art Foundation)
, London, to
present
a new exhibition for the
13
th
edition of
Propos d’Europe
. The invitation is within the
framework of its programme of partnerships with European foundations, initiated in 2013.
From 3 October to 20 December
Le musée d'une nuit (script for leaving tr
aces)
, curated by
Vincent Honoré (Director, DRAF), brings together some thirty works from the two thousand
comprising the D
avid Roberts
C
ollection
as well as a number of special commissions
,
for
DRAF’s first exhibition outside the United Kingdom.
Painting
s, drawings, photographs
, sculptures, installations
and
film
s
by modern artists such as
Man Ray
or
Tamara de Lempicka
,
and contemporary figures including
Nina Beier
and
Marie Lund, Yto
Barrada, Martin Boyce, Enrico David, Michael Dean, Ayan Farah, Bethan H
uws, Pierre
Huyghe, Sergej Jensen, Renaud Jerez, Sarah Lucas, Benoît Maire, Marlie Mul
and
Rosemarie
Trockel
take over the former architectural practice, built in
1927
by
Robert Mallet
-
Stevens
and now
the
headquarters of the Fondation Hippocr
è
ne
.
“
Every b
uilding
created by Robert
Mallet
-
Stevens
looks like one of his film sets, and the
people in it are like actors.
Like film sets, Mallet
-
Stevens’ buildings proceed by indications (base,
window, chimney, etc., defined simply, just enough to be recognisable) a
nd act by suggestion, putting the
onus on the beholder to recreate the totality using the fragments with which they are provided.” writes
architectural historian
Fernando Montes.
The practice
-
or studio
-
of
Mallet
-
Stevens (1886
-
1945),
founder of the
Un
ion des Artistes Modernes
(1929),
was built during the golden age of modernist architecture by one of the major architects of the day, on a par
with
Le Corbusier
. However, Mallet
-
Stevens’ body of work began to fade soon after his death.
Almost none
of his
constructions
have survived
:
only
traces
remain
.
Most of his
villas
were left incomplete or
were altered. The larger buildings were destroyed or denatured. It was only in 2005, with a retrospective
exhibition at the
Pompidou
Centre
, that his work began to
enjoy greater public recognition.
This exhibition is articulated in relation to its context, and to the twofold figures of the
architect
and
collector
.
To present a
collection
is implicitly to paint a portrait of the person who created it. This makes us
t
hink of a collection not in terms of a process of accumulation but as a fundamental
dynamics of loss
. To
exhibit works in a
Mallet
-
Stevens
building is to inhabit a memory of architecture and the sets
of silent films
(Mallet
-
Stevens
started his career build
ing sets, notably for the filmmaker
Marcel
L’Herbier).
In addition to works from the
David Roberts
C
ollection
, the exhibition will include
special commissions
from artists with a long relationship with DRAF.
Benoît Maire
has made a work inspired by Man Ra
y’s 1929
film
Les Mystères du Château du Dé
,
shown in one of the Fondation’s spaces, while
Nina Beier
and
Marie
Lund
are reactivating a performance previously given at DRAF in
2008.
Renaud Jerez will present a new
intervention in the space.
Propos
d’Europe 13: Le musée d'une nuit (script for leaving traces)
is an exhibition which
proposes an experience of loss. Notions of trace, conservation and ruin sustain a fiction in
which artworks from the 1930s to the present play on a certain formal fragilit
y, orchestrating
an exhibition that reveals itself to its own remnant, staged within a space that itself exists as
an echo of what it once was.
This exhibition is part of the
Parcours Privé
section of
F
IAC
2014.
Created in
1992
by
Jean
and
Mona Guyot
, t
he
Fondation Hippocrène
is an independent family
-
run
foundation recognised as promoting the public interest. Its main role is to bring together European youth, to
“make Europe a living reality” by providing financial support for cultural, educational, huma
nitarian and
social projects. Since 2001, the Fondation has been headquartered in the former studio of architect Mallet
-
Stevens and, since 2002, it has hosted art exhibitions under the general title
Propos d’Europe
,
each designed
to spotlight the art scene
of a given country, and so promoting Europe’s cultural richness.
DRAF
is an independent non
-
profit space for contemporary art in London, founded by collector David
Roberts in 2007. It is directed by Vincent Honoré (formerly of Tate Modern, London and Pal
ais de Tokyo,
Paris); who with his team produces ambitious, often collaborative, programmes of exhibitions, commissions
and live events. All DRAF projects are open free to the public.
DRAF is constantly evolving, making new spaces for artists and curators
to develop diverse and innovative
projects within its framework. In 2012, DRAF moved to a converted furniture factory in Mornington
Crescent, enabling an expanded programme of production, performances, screenings, research and
discussions. In 2014, DRAF w
ill activate satellite projects outside its London headquarters to expand its
ongoing dialogue with contemporary ideas and practices, starting with this exhibition at the Fondation
Hippocrène, Paris.
Image: Yto Barrada, Wallpaper — Tangier, 2001 Courtesy de l’artiste et David Roberts Collection, London
Opening 3 October
Hippocrene Foundation
12, rue Mallet-Stevens-Paris Francia.
Hour: Tuesday to Saturday, 2pm
–
7pm
Fre Admission