information pack - Fondation d`entreprise Hermès

EXHIBITION
RÊVE D’OBSCUR
AU PAYS DES ÉTOILES
TERRESTRES
April 21
to September 19, 2016
La Grande Place
Musée du cristal Saint-Louis
Saint-Louis-lès-Bitche
Curated by
49 Nord 6 Est – Frac Lorraine,
Metz
PRESSKIT
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AU PAYS DES ÉTOILES TERRESTRES
(‘DARK DREAMING: IN THE LAND OF THE ÉTOILES TERRESTRES’)
APRIL 21 TO SEPTEMBER 19, 2016
Private view, Wednesday April 20 at 6.30 p.m.
ARTISTS FROM THE COLLECTION
OF 49 NORD 6 EST
LA GRANDE PLACE
MUSÉE DU CRISTAL SAINT-LOUIS
Rue Coëtlosquet
57620 Saint-Louis-lès-Bitche
France
The Museum is open daily except Tuesday
from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Neal Beggs
Benoît Billotte
Jingfang Hao & Lingjie Wang
Bill Henson
Barbara & Michael Leisgen
Éric Poitevin
Katrin Ströbel
Charwei Tsai
The exhibition is open daily except Tuesday
from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Admission free with a valid
museum ticket: 6 €, 3 €
Information: +33 3 87 06 40 04
Exhibition curated by:
49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz
PRESS CONTACTS
HERMÈS INTERNATIONAL
INTERNATIONAL MEDIA DIRECTOR
Ina Delcourt
LA GRANDE PLACE,
MUSÉE DU CRISTAL SAINT-LOUIS
Barbara & Michael Leisgen, The Light – The Person – The World, 1975
Coll. 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz © B. & M. Leisgen
FONDATION D’ENTREPRISE HERMÈS
Philippe Boulet
+33 6 82 28 00 47
[email protected]
Véronique Doh +33 3 87 06 60 12
[email protected]
CRISTALLERIE SAINT-LOUIS
PRESS CONTACT
Lorraine de Boisanger
+33 1 42 61 09 09
[email protected]
Annelise Catineau +33 1 40 17 48 23
[email protected]
49 NORD 6 EST - FRAC LORRAINE, METZ
Valérie Audren-Guelton +33 3 87 74 20 02
[email protected]
High-res images are available at:
www.fondationdentreprisehermes.org/Phototheque
(password available on request)
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The group exhibition Rêve d’obscur: au pays des Étoiles terrestres at La Grande Place,
Musée du cristal Saint-Louis, in Saint-Louis-lès-Bitche (Moselle), is produced
by the Fondation d’entreprise Hermès, as part of its continuing support for
temporary exhibitions at the Foundation’s own art spaces (in Brussels, Singapore,
Seoul and Tokyo), and in partnership with leading public institutions (Formes Simples
with the Centre Pompidou-Metz).
Each year, the Foundation presents two exhibitions of contemporary art at Saint-Louis,
with a focus on artisanship and/or skilled expertise. The themed exhibitions are co-produced
with leading cultural institutions in the Lorraine region, in association with the cristallerie
Saint-Louis and La Grande Place, Musée du cristal Saint-Louis. Each institution co-curates
a season of three consecutive shows. Following the inaugural season, co-produced
with the Centre Pompidou-Metz, our guest institution for 2016 is the region’s public
fund for contemporary art, 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, in Metz.
Rêve d’obscur: au pays des Étoiles terrestres is the first exhibition of this new season.
“The Sun encounters the Moon, the stars rendez-vous with Earth, the visible world with its dark side.
This exhibition is designed to lead us on an exploration of the hidden, dark side of things…
An extraordinary invitation to a journey beyond the land of the Étoiles terrestres.
Hypothesis and fantasy are the key to this speculative theme, offering irrational but undeniable poetic tools
for the apprehension of distant realms. What powers of the mind must we summon to contemplate
unknown territories? What mechanisms stir and spark our projective imagination?
Human beings have long scrutinised, studied
and mapped the sky, and land masses and oceans
here on Earth.
Works from the collection of 49 Nord 6 Est and pieces by guest artists are presented here
as a sensitive response
to scientific and geographical data. From the experience of disorientation (Neal Beggs, Éric Poitevin)
or spirituality (Barbara & Michael Leisgen, Charwei Tsai), to work with light (Bill Henson), and efforts
to measure the world around us (Benoît Billotte, Jingfang Hao & Lingjie Wang, Katrin Ströbel) – works
in the show invite us to apprehend reality, reinterpret our environment in new and different ways, and share
the artists’ irresistible attraction
to other possible worlds.” — 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz
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EXHIBITED ARTISTS
NEAL BEGGS
Born 1959 in Larne, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom
Lives and works in La Varenne, France
Neal Beggs, Starmaps. High and Low Summits/Metz, 2006
Map, 57 x 78 cm Sponsored by 49 Nord 6 Est
– Frac Lorraine, Metz © Neal Beggs
Exhibited work – Starmaps. High and Low Summits/Saint-Louis-lès-Bitche, 2016
New work supported by the patronage of the Fondation d’entreprise Hermès, as part of the exhibition
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz
A representation of a starry sky, or the mapping of a territory? Artist Neal Beggs spreads black ink over a map
of Saint-Louis-lès-Bitche, picking out its high points with myriad white dots: a star for Grand Wintersberg
peak, another for the hilltop castle of Ramstein. The brightest stars correspond to the highest summits. A former
mountaineer, the artist lets his experience of high places shape his current practice, working across disciplines
and blurring the boundaries between art and life. From La Grande Place, Musée du cristal Saint-Louis,
to the CIAV (the international centre for glass-making arts) in Meisenthal and the Lalique glass museum
in Wingen-sur-Moder — known collectively as the three Étoiles terrestres — viewers are invited to take a map
and explore the region’s ‘heart of glass’. Neal Beggs’ work repurposes conventional cartography, guiding us
to a ‘space of dreams’.
BENOÎT BILLOTTE
Born 1983 in Metz, France
Lives and works in Geneva, Switzerland
Exhibited work – Sun Line, 2011/2016
New work supported by the patronage of the Fondation d’entreprise Hermès,
as part of the exhibition – Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz
Benoît Billotte, Sun Line, 2011/2016
Installation in situ, variable dimensions
© Benoît Billotte
A schoolroom blackboard, chalked with curved lines: Sun Line seems to convey
a truth, but which one? Using data collected since 1761, Benoît Billotte
offers a reading of our Sun’s activity — an unchanging series of solar cycles,
each lasting a dozen years. But could this regular sequence be threatened?
The great Ice Ages on Earth were the result of solar activity, but some
physicists claim their alternating pattern may decelerate in future years.
Sun Line is an electrocardiogram of the Sun, drawn in chalk — an impermanent
work addressing the impact of the heavenly bodies on our lives.
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Exhibited work – Hollow Earth, 2015/2016
New work supported by the patronage of the Fondation d’entreprise Hermès,
as part of the exhibition – Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz
Benoît Billotte, Hollow Earth, 2015/2016
Light projection, variable dimensions
Courtesy of Galerie Sandra Recio
© Benoît Billotte
Like Jules Verne’s Journey to the Centre of the Earth (1864), Benoît Billotte
invites us to peer into the depths of our blue planet — to the underworld
of the Greek god Hades, or the realm of the Dark Elves in Nordic mythology?
Inspired by scientific theories developed in the late 17th century, the artist
presents a hollow Earth, its interior accessed via the Poles, decorated
with mountains, clouds and a Sun. Created especially for the exhibition
Rêve d’obscur : au pays des Étoiles terrestres, the piece evokes the Sun
and its shadows, with a play on voids and solids, the internal and external,
inviting us to look at everyday reality from a different perspective,
and transporting us to a mystical realm, the land of the Étoiles terrestres.
JINGFANG HAO & LINGJIE WANG
Born 1985 in Shandong, China and born 1984 in Shanghai, China
Live and work in Mulhouse, France
Exhibited work – Sun Drawings, April 2015
Jingfang Hao and Chin Ling jie Wang, Sun Drawings, 2015 – Drawings on thermal paper, 30 x 30 cm
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz © Jingfang Hao & Ling jie Wang
The Sun Drawings by artist couple Jingfang Hao & Lingjie Wang give physical expression to immaterial
phenomena, capturing the light of the Sun and playing with its cast shadows. A magnifying glass is used to
concentrate the Sun’s rays onto a sheet of thermal paper; the resulting series of fifteen drawings makes palpable
the passage of time. Marking the daily progress of the Sun’s rays, the shaft of light leaves a dark, burnt trace
as it moves across the paper. The resulting mark depends on the strength of the Sun’s rays: as such, the work also
addresses the phenomenon of global warming. Beyond the finished result, the artists are fascinated by the mystery
of the mark’s appearance on the paper, and its progression. Centred on the opposition of white and dark brown,
the circle and the square, their work is rooted in the concept of the alliance of opposites, inherited from
the philosophy of Yin and Yang.
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BILL HENSON
Born 1955 in Melbourne, Australia
Lives and works in Sydney, Australia
Exhibited work – Untitled,
1983-1984 – Collection 49 Nord
6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz
Bill Henson, Untitled, 1983-1984 – Triptych, colour photographs, 74 x 99 cm
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz © Bill Henson
The triptych format, the use of chiaroscuro, over-exposed subjects, artistic soft-focus… all contribute
to the work’s dramatic narrative impact. The scene takes place in a rocaille interior decorated with mirrors,
crystal chandeliers and candelabra. Shell motifs, fleurons and scrolling curves fill the space, contrasting
with the emptiness of the portrait. Gazing into the distance, the young woman opens up the photographic
frame and transports us to another place. Henson writes that what matters most in a work is not what is most
clearly defined, but what is subsumed by shadow. In these photographs, the artist uses light to penetrate
the ways of darkness.
MICHAEL & BARBARA LEISGEN
Born 1944 in Spital am Pyhrn, Austria,
and born 1940 in Gengenbach, Germany
Live and work in Aachen, Germany
Exhibited work – The Light – The Person – The World, 1975/2016
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz
The Description of the Sun, 1975/2016
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz
Three Sun Figures, 1977/2016
Collection Frac Champagne-Ardenne, Reims
Barbara & Michael Leisgen,
The Light – The Person – The World, 1975 – Silver gelatin print
on Baryta paper, mounted on Dibond®, 80 x 120 cm
The Description of the Sun, 1975 – Black and white photograph, 84 x 124 cm
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz © Barbara & Michael Leisgen
Man and Sun come face-to-face in Barbara and Michael Leisgen’s
work, in a re-examination of the Greek etymology of the word
photography — literally, ‘sun writing’. Here, the sun is an accessory:
Barbara is haloed in light in the first photograph, and carries the
Sun under her arm in the second. In The Description of the Sun
(Die Beschreibung der Sonne), sunlight traces symbolic marks, like
a calligraphy brush. As in many world mythologies, the Sun — a
source of extraordinary energy — appears as an object of creation
and destruction alike. Part dreamlike celebration of light, part dark
meditation, the photographs offer a sublime vision of Nature.
Barbara & Michael Leisgen, Three Sun Figures (detail), 1977
Triptych, colour photographs, 100 x 300 cm
Collection Frac Champagne-Ardenne, Reims © Barbara & Michael Leisgen
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ÉRIC POITEVIN
Born 1961 in Longuyon, France
Lives and works in Mangiennes, France
Exhibited work – Untitled, 1993-1994
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz
Éric Poitevin’s photographs have an impenetrable quality: despite their sharp, descriptive clarity,
they convey only the surface of the visible world. Are these spherical forms mineral, vegetable or human?
Should we read them as planets in the dark matter of space? The human skeleton and celestial bodies
are closely connected: when a star disappears, a vast quantity of calcium, exactly the kind found
in our bones, spreads across the universe. Traditional symbols of death, the skulls seen here are sources
of light. The use of repetition, the plain black ground, the geometric motifs, the association of dark
and light, all contribute to a creeping sense of doubt as to the nature of the forms before us,
freeing the imagination for new possibilities.
Éric Poitevin, Untitled, 1993-1994
Colour photography, 41 x 41 cm
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz
© ADAGP
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KATRIN STRÖBEL
Born 1975 in Pforzheim, Germany
Based in Stuttgart, Germany, Nice, France and travelling
Exhibited work – Pole, 2008/2016
New work supported by the patronage of the Fondation
d’entreprise Hermès, as part of the exhibition
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est – Frac Lorraine, Metz
Katrin Ströbel, Pole, 2008 – Installation, gouache, diameter 350 cm
View of the exhibition at Heike Strelow Gallery, Frankfurt © Katrin Ströbel
This map of the world is surrounded by coordinates, and crowded with territories and parallels.
Searching for a point of reference, the viewer’s gaze is lost in the mass of information, and struggles to pick out
the familiar continents. Only the title suggests a way in: situated on the Earth’s axis of rotation, the Pole marks
the axis of our own reading. Ströbel created this work after studying Arab maps during a trip to Morocco.
As on an 11th-century mappamundi, there are multitudinous seas, fragmented land masses and a dedication
inscribed in a central cartouche. But the artist draws on contrasting sources to create a personal
cartography, too, questioning our Eurocentric perspective, the notion of frontiers, and the relative
nature of cartographic representations.
CHARWEI TSAI
Born 1980 in Taipei, Taiwan
Lives and works in Taipei, Taiwan, and Paris, France
Exhibited work – Plane Tree Mantra, 2014/2016
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz
Form is emptiness and the emptiness is form.
The Heart Sutra, painted by Charwei Tsai on a tree
in the village of Saint-Louis-lès-Bitche, explores
the fleeting nature of material things.
Charwei Tsai, Plane Tree Mantra, 2014 – Performance
The natural bark support, and the ink used to write
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz © Charwai Tsai
the inscription, resonate with the meaning
of this celebrated Buddhist text. Just as the Chinese
characters will disappear over time, just as the tree will become covered in lichen, so nothing
is fixed, nothing lasts. This work combines the memory of a thousand-year-old piece of philosophy,
the artist’s memory, the memories of people living in the Bitche region, and the memory
of an ancient tree, crossing cultures and transporting us to unknown lands.
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PRESS IMAGES
High-res images are available at: www.fondationdentreprisehermes.org/Phototheque
(password available on request) Views of the exhibition will be available after the preview.
Neal Beggs, Starmaps. High and Low Summits/Metz, 2006
Map, 57 x 78 cm – Sponsored by 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz
© Neal Beggs
Barbara & Michael Leisgen, The Light – The Person – The World, 1975
Silver gelatin print on Baryta paper, mounted on Dibond®, 80 x 120 cm
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz © Barbara & Michael Leisgen
Barbara & Michael Leisgen, The Description of the Sun, 1975
Black and white photograph, 84 x 124 cm
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz © Barbara & Michael Leisgen
Barbara & Michael Leisgen,
Three Sun Figures (detail), 1977
Benoît Billotte, Sun Line, 2011/2016
Installation in situ, variable dimensions © Benoît Billotte
Triptych, colour photographs, 100 x 300 cm
Collection Frac Champagne-Ardenne, Reims
© Barbara & Michael Leisgen
Benoît Billotte, Hollow Earth, 2015/2016
Light projection, variable dimensions
Courtesy of Galerie Sandra Recio © Benoît Billotte
Katrin Ströbel, Pole, 2008
Installation, gouache, diameter 350 cm
View of the exhibition at Heike Strelow Gallery,
Frankfurt © Katrin Ströbel
Jingfang Hao and Chin Lingjie Wang, Sun Drawings, 2015
Drawings on thermal paper, 30 x 30 cm
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz © Jingfang Hao & Lingjie Wang
Charwei Tsai, Plane Tree Mantra, 2014
Performance – Collection 49 Nord 6 Est
– Frac Lorraine, Metz © Charwai Tsai
Bill Henson, Untitled, 1983-1984
Triptych, colour photographs, 74 x 99 cm
Collection 49 Nord 6 Est - Frac Lorraine, Metz © Bill Henson
La Grande Place,
Musée du cristal Saint-Louis
Photo : Jean-Claude Kanny
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THE FONDATION D’ENTREPRISE HERMÈS
The Fondation d’entreprise Hermès supports men and women seeking to learn, perfect, transmit
and explore the creative gestures that shape our lives today and into the future. Guided by our central focus
on skills and innovation, the Foundation’s activities follow two complementary paths: know-how
and creativity, know-how and the transmission of skills.
The Foundation develops its own programmes in the contemporary visual arts (exhibitions and artists’
residencies), photography (Immersion), performing arts (new settings), design (the Prix Émile Hermès)
and craftsmanship (the Skills Academy), together with international calls for projects promoting biodiversity
and solidarity. At the same time, we support the activities of organisations in these areas, around the world.
The Foundation’s unique, diverse activities are governed by a single over-arching belief: Our gestures define us.
• www.fondationdentreprisehermes.org
THE CRISTALLERIE SAINT-LOUIS
Founded in 1586, the Münzthal glassworks became the Verrerie Royale de Saint-Louis in 1767 and finally
the cristallerie Saint-Louis following the discovery of the secret of lead crystal-making in 1781. The cristallerie
became part of the Hermès Group in 1989. Today, Saint-Louis creates internationally renowned crystal
pieces for the home, in lighting, tableware and decoration. • www.saint-louis.com
LA GRANDE PLACE, MUSÉE DU CRISTAL SAINT-LOUIS
Inaugurated in 2007 and located at the heart of the manufacture, La Grande Place, the manufacture’s museum,
offers a journey of discovery of its permanent collection of 2000 ancient Saint-Louis crystal piece, each more
fascinating than the next. Guided visits of the Saint-Louis crystal manufacture are also available upon request.
• www.saint-louis.com/fr/musee-manufacture/grande-place
THE 49 NORD 6 EST - FRAC LORRAINE, METZ
As a hybrid public institution, 49 Nord 6 Est defines itself as a platform for reflection, and an open, accessible
forum for exchange at the heart of France’s exciting, rapidly evolving eastern region. Taking a cross-disciplinary
approach, 49 Nord 6 Est invites thought leaders, artists, militants, therapists and philosophers of all stripes
and none,
to stimulate and encourage new thinking on the issues confronting us today. 49 Nord 6 Est gathers and implements
ideas and protocols, with a particular focus on women’s perspectives. We seek to hold up a mirror to a society
undergoing profound change, as an incitement to dream, rather than suffer our world! • Follow our latest news at:
www.fraclorraine.org • Discover our permanent collection: http://collection.fraclorraine.org
49 Nord 6 Est - Fonds Régional d’Art Contemporain is supported by Région Alsace - Champagne-Ardenne - Lorraine
and the French Ministry of Culture and Communication - DRAC.
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SELECTED HIGHLIGHTS
FROM
THE FONDATION
D’ENTREPRISE HERMÈS
— Know-how and creativity
IMMERSION: A FRANCO-AMERICAN
PHOTOGRAPHIC COMMISSION
Alessandra Sanguinetti in France
in partnership with the Aperture Foundation residency
from January to June 2016
EXHIBITION: CHARLES FRÉGER
YOKAÏNOSHIMA
Le Forum, Tokyo, Japan
February 19 – May 8, 2016
EXHIBITION: DOUG DUBOIS
Aperture Foundation, New York, NY, USA
March 23 – May 19, 2016
EXHIBITION: POESIE BALISTIQUE
La Verrière, Brussels, Belgium
April 23 – July 2, 2016
EXHIBITION: SAÂDANE AFIF
Atelier Hermès, Seoul, Korea
May 6 – July 10, 2016
EXHIBITION: DAWN NG
HOW TO DISAPPEAR INTO A RAINBOW
Aloft at Hermès, Singapoure
May 15 – July 31, 2016
PRIX EMILE HERMÈS INTERNATIONAL DESIGN
AWARD:
PLAY
Exhibition of finalists’ prototypes and award ceremony
Espace Commines, paris
May 30 – June 5, 2016
DANSE ÉLARGIE
International call for projects Paris / Seoul
June 11 – May 16, 2016
— Know-how and transmission of skills
SKILLS ACADEMY #3
LE MÉTAL
Call for entries
May 2 – July 10, 2016
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