The show presents 26 photographs representing works of art that belonged to the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Burton Tremaine. Photographing works of art, the artist repositions them by examining both the way in which the public reacts to such works and the place that they occupy in the spatial, social or economic environment.
The Tremaine Pictures
BFAS Blondeau Fine Art Services will have the pleasure of presenting, on its
premises at 5, rue de la Muse and in cooperation with Metro Pictures Gallery, New
York, an exhibition by the American artist Louise Lawler entitled Louise Lawler: The
Tremaine Pictures 1984-2007.
Born in 1947 in Bronxville/NY, Louise Lawler lives and works in Brooklyn. A member
of the Appropriationist Movement (alongside figures such as Richard Prince, Cindy
Sherman, Sherrie Levine, Jenny Holzer and Barbara Kruger), Louise Lawler began her
career in the late nineteen-seventies. Photographing works of art, she repositions
them by examining both the way in which the public reacts to such works and the
place that they occupy in the spatial, social or economic environment. She therefore
plays on the contrast between the way that a work of art is conventionally
represented and the detail of its presentation. She often focuses less on the work
than on its immediate surroundings. This in turn affects our perception of the work,
which comes to be defined less by its putative 'essence' and more by the context in
which it is seen: the collector's apartment, the museum or the auction house. Over
and beyond the issues of representation that her photographs seek to illustrate, Law
ler's work is also that of a visual artist researching space and light to exquisite
effect.
We are especially happy to devote a first exhibition to the complete Tremaine
Pictures series. For this exhibition, we have assembled 26 photographs (color and
black & white) produced between 1984 and 2007, all of them representing works of
art that belonged to the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Burton Tremaine. The Tremaine
brought a well-informed and visionary eye to their collecting between 1945 and 1970.
They built a group of over 400 major works including the excellence of American
Abstract Expressionism and Pop Art (Warhol, Pollock, Mondrian, Jasper Johns,
Rauschenberg …). In 1984, Louise Lawler met Burton and Emily Tremaine and
photographed their remarkable collection in situ, in their residences in New York
and in Connecticut. Later, she will photograph the same works exhibited in a museum,
in 1984, and then, in 1988 and 1991, hung in auction houses.
Louise Lawler's work has been widely showcased at major solo exhibitions in Europe
and the US and the public is able to see her photographs in important art
institutions such as the Museum of Contemporary Art of Chicago and Los Angeles, the
Museum of Modern Art and the Whitney Museum in New York, the Centre Georges Pompidou
in Paris or the Sprengel Museum of Hannover.
To coincide with the exhibition, we are publishing a 94 pages catalogue reproducing
the complete series and enriched by two documented essays. An edition of 100 in
black & white will be also available.
Opening: 13 sept 2007
BFAS Blondeau Fine Art Services
rue de la Muse 5, Geneve
Admission free