Six Ways to Sunday, CAC Brétigny

Reversibility – A Theatre of De-Creation Chapter III
2012/05/19

A play by Pierre Bal-Blanc, staged by the author with Andrea Büttner, Esther Ferrer, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Sanja Ivekovic, Ben Kinmont, Jiri Kovanda, Marcello Maloberti, Teresa Margolles, Emilie Parendeau, Martha Rosler, Santiago Sierra, Slaven Tolj, Isidoro Valcarcel Medina. Reversibility: A Theatre of De-Creation explores, in exhibition form, the “promotion and display” of artworks by proposing their “de-creation” or temporarily conversion into an alternative cognitive model, in order to allow the public to examine the work of a group of artists. The aim is also to show the reversibility of two movements of creation and de-creation that are at work in all circumstances: in the moment when the creative process comes to be qualified as an artwork, on the one hand, and, on the other, in the moment when an artwork is disqualified in the form of a commodity or cultural fetish.

The prologue to Reversibility took place in 2008 at the stall of the Fair Gallery (gb agency, Paris; Hollybush Gardens, London; Jan Mot, Brussels; Raster Gallery, Warsaw) during the Frieze Art Fair in London. It was further developed in a public institution in 2008 at the CAC Brétigny (The Center for Contemporary Art in Brétigny, France) and concluded in 2012 at Peep-Hole, in Milan, within the context of an independent non-profit structure financed by donations from artists. The actantial structure of Reversibility: A Theatre of De-Creation in three parts takes the form of classical drama: exposition, climax and denouement. For each chapter and among each group of works, a particular piece is specifically related to each setting (in turn, commercial, institutional and private) in a principle of functional and symbolic equivalence: Dos Espacios Modificados (1967/2008) by David Lamelas during the Frieze Art Fair in London; Floating Wall by Robert Breer at the Centre d’art contemporain in Brétigny, France; No Necesita Titulo (1990/2012) by Isidoro Valcarcel Medina for Peep-Hole, a non-profit art space in Milan.

Reversibility – A Theatre of De-Creation is part of Six Ways to Sunday, an annual programme in which Peep-Hole dedicates an event to a partnership with a foreign art institution, becoming its temporary satellite project room. After Museion Bolzano in 2010 and CAC Vilnius in 2011, the 2012 event is devoted to CAC Brétigny.

CAC Brétigny – the art centre of Brétigny is a place for contemporary art. The definition and the development of its missions have influenced the functions of its space that shall be devoted to production, exhibition and documentation and kept on being in a movement of permanent evolution. All along the programming of shows, collaborations with artists kept on developing new projects as means of creation and education, facilitating social relationships between the inside of the art space and the neighborhood. A significant number of art works realized for the art centre and organized around the idea of “Phalanstère” are permanently or alternatively visible. cacbretigny.com

The exhibition is part of Shrinking World, a project set up with the contribution of Fondazione Cariplo. Thanks to: The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Generali Foundation Collection, Vienna, Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI), New York, The Felix Gonzalez-Torres Foundation, New York, FRAC Lorraine Collection, Metz, Air de Paris, Paris, GB Agency, Paris, Galleria Raffaella Cortese, Milan, Hollybush Gardens, London, Galerie Peter Kilchmann, Zurich, ProjecteSD, Barcelona, Prometeogallery di Ida Pisani Milan/Lucca. Special thanks to the charities involved in Isidoro Valcarcel Medina’s piece: Centro Sant’Antonio, Convento dei Padri Cappuccini, Opera Messa della Carità, Opera Pane Sant’Antonio, Opera San Francesco per i Poveri, Opera Pia Pane Quotidiano.

01. Peep-Hole, installation view
Isidoro Valcárcel Medina, No Necesita Título, 1990 Madrid - 2012 Milan
Courtesy the artist
Ph: Alessandro Zambianchi

02. Esther Ferrer
Intime et personnel
1970s - 2012
Performance
Courtesy the artist and FRAC Lorraine
Ph: Alessandro Zambianchi

03. Isidoro Valcárcel Medina, No Necesita Título, 1990 Madrid - 2012 Milan. Installation, Courtesy the artist
Esther Ferrer, Intime et personnel, 1970s - 2012. Wall drawing. Courtesy the artist and FRAC Lorraine
Ph: Alessandro Zambianchi

04. Peep-Hole, exhibition view
From left: Sanja Ivekovic, BIRRA, AMORE E FANTASIA/”OH” u OHA, 1975-76 from the series “Sweet Life” paper and photo montage. Courtesy Generali Foundation Collection, Vienna. Isidoro Valcárcel Medina, No Necesita Título, 1990 Madrid - 2012 Milan, Installation, Courtesy the artist
Ph: Alessandro Zambianchi

05. Peep-Hole, exhibition view
Ph: Alessandro Zambianchi 2012

06. Emilie Parendeau
A LOUER #8. JIŘÍ KOVANDA, UNTITLED
LAWRENCE WEINER, IN AND OUT. OUT AND IN. AND IN AND OUT. AND OUT AND IN, 2012, 2 kg of sugar
Courtesy gb agency, Paris and Ghislain Mollet-Viéville Collection / Mamco, Geneva
Ph: Alessandro Zambianchi

07. Ben Kinmont
Congratulations, 1995, Flowers
Courtesy the artist and Air de Paris, Paris
Ph: Alessandro Zambianchi

08. Teresa Margolles
Plato de Fruta, 2004, ceramic
Courtesy the artist and Galerie Peter Kilchmann, Zurich
Ph: Alessandro Zambianchi

09. Martha Rosler
Semiotics of the Kitchen, 1975
video, 6:09 min.
Courtesy FRAC Lorraine and Electronic Arts Intermix, New York
Ph: Alessandro Zambianchi

10. Marcello Maloberti
Cleopatra, 2012
found postcards, packets of cigarettes
Courtesy the artist and Galleria Raffaella Cortese, Milan
Ph: Alessandro Zambianchi

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