document de travail22/11/2010

Press release
Painting Otherwise
Contemporary Art and the
French Riviera,
Experimental Grounds
1951-2011
26 June - 7 November 2011
Musées nationaux du XXe siècle
des Alpes-Maritimes
an exhibition organised by the
Musée national Marc Chagall, Nice,
Musée national Fernand Léger, Biot,
Musée national Pablo Picasso,
La Guerre et la Paix, Vallauris and
the Rmn-GP.
In summer 2011, Contemporary Art and the French Riviera, Experimental Grounds will
demonstrate
the
extraordinary
creativity
of
this
region
in
some
twenty
venues
(museums, art centres, and galleries) strung along the Mediterranean coast from
Vallauris to Menton, through Biot, Vence and Nice.
For this event, the Musées nationaux du XXe siècle des Alpes-Maritimes have selected
works by artists whose research explores the act of painting and various devices for
deconstructing
art.
The
exhibition
spans
sixty
years
of
creativity
and
brings
together many artists who lived or worked in the region or had a significant impact
there. Their work is part of a general exploration of the very nature of painting,
and the events, tools and media that bring it into being. They focus on supports and
surfaces, experiments with pigment or dye on canvas, the physical reality of the
stretcher and other components of pictures and sculpture. Although some belonged to
movements such as New Realism, Support/Surfaces or Groupe 70, they all took part in
the international questioning of the customary definitions and functions of a work
of art.
At the Musée national Fernand Léger, proposals from Hartung’s last period will be
shown alongside Arman’s Allures d’objets, Yves Klein’s Cosmogonies and Malaval’s
Paillettes. Such works not only permit a different interpretation of art movements
but also provide a historical foundation for later proposals. And later proposals
are not lacking: Ben’s Gestes (Geste: me peindre, 1964), Noël Dolla’s experiments on
canvas or other materials such as tarlatan, floor cloths or landscapes; Claude
Viallat’s instantly recognisable form laid on all kinds of supports; confrontations
of objects or materials by Bernard Pagès and his variations on the act of sculpting.
The members of Groupe 70 naturally have their place in this movement in which
painting and critical thinking about painting are one and the same. All these
approaches are in phase with what others were doing at the same time, elsewhere, in
Paris but also in the United States.
Floor Cloths, Noël Dolla, 1967-1999 © Noël Dolla, 1999
But the artists of the seventies were not the only ones to question painting and
what
it
involved.
The
exhibition
at
the
Musée
national
Marc
Chagall
shows
how
the
following generation, as well as many artists today, explored the nature of painting
and its limitations and ways in which they can still be extended. Adrian Schiess and
Pascal Pinaud both work on these issues, one focusing on monochrome mirror surfaces
and the other showing how accidents of all sorts give surfaces an undeniable plastic
reality.
The
black
depth
of
the
fluid
surfaces
presented
by
the
BP
group
reflects
the
critical spirit which brought them to the public eye. It interacts with those shaped
by Ghada Amer, Dominique Figarella, Cédric Teisseire, Marc Chevalier, Aïcha Hamu,
Julien Bouillon and many others taking part in this exhibition.
Echoing
the
1969
exhibition
at
Coaraze
in
the
hinterland
of
Nice,
the
Musées
nationaux
du XXe siècle des Alpes-Maritimes have formed a partnership with the city to program
an exhibition of the work of young artists. Pierre Descamps, Frédérique Nalbandian,
Emilie Perotto and Xavier Theunis have been asked to set up installations in public
spaces especially for the event.
.................................
curated by : Maurice Fréchuret, director of the Musées nationaux du XXe siècle
des Alpes-Maritimes
Ariane Coulondre, curator at the Musée national Fernand Léger
...............................
Musée national Marc Chagall
Musée national Pablo Picasso,
Press contacts
La Guerre et la Paix, Vallauris,
Rmn-GP
www.musee-chagall.fr
place de la Libération
Head of the press
access: take bus no. 22 or 15
+33 (0)4 93 64 71 83
department
from Nice railway station;
www.musee-picasso-vallauris.fr
Florence Le Moing
access:
+33 (0)1 40 13 47 62
by rail Nice railway station,
[email protected]
avenue Docteur Ménard
06000 Nice, +33 (0)4 93 53 87 20
by car, follow the signs
from the city centre
open: every day except Tuesdays,
from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
to Golfe Juan,
(5 p.m. from 1 November)
shuttle bus from Golfe Juan
Annick Duboscq
admission: €9.50,
to Vallauris
[email protected]
concession: €7.50
Cannes railway station,
including the permanent collections
take the Vallauris-Aéroport
- Nice-Cote d’Azur bus,
Musée national Fernand Léger
chemin du Val de Pome
bus line between Nice and Cannes
06 410 Biot, +33(0)4 92 91 50 30
operated by Bus rapides Cote
www.fernandleger.fr
d’Azur
access: 15 km from Nice-Côte
by road, take the RN7 or
d’Azur airport;
motorway A8,
Biot railway station and
exit Antibes, then RD 135 to
then Envibus no.10
(bus stop Musée Fernand Léger).
Vallauris
By motorway, Villeneuve-Loubet exit;
open: every day except Tuesdays,
RN7, 2 km then Antibes, then Biot
from 10 to 12:15 a.m. and from 2
open: every day except Tuesdays,
p.m. to 6 p.m.
from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
(5 p.m. closing from 15
(5 p.m. from 1 November)
d i
i
7 50
i
6
September);
Musées nationaux du
e
XX siècle des
Alpes-Maritimes
Françoise Borello
+33 (0)6 70 74 38 71
[email protected]