After Bohemia I was a little reluctant about going to see Bertrand Lavier. Some of his installations I already knew from the M.A.M. Reading Beaux Arts Magazine, as much as the article was interesting - I was not convinced. The marvels about having an ICOM card is that if you don’t like the exhibition, you turn around and leave.
So without too much enthusiam I went off to the Beaubourg after an hour and a half of conferences on 16th/17th century sculpture at the Ecole du Louvre. In my mind as I walked from the Louvre to Beaubourg I was trying to work out what the morning had really taught me and what I had recalled or would recall. Suddenly I was there.
From the 16th century to present day art can be a bit of a shock to the system but not only was it a shock, it was a very pleasant one. Bertrand Lavier certainly shakes up the most solid categories in the history of art. Crashed cars, African statues, Neons tubes looking not alike the American artist Frank Stella, Picasso. In actual fact it is the wing of the Picasso car. As an anecdote: one of the Picasso family recently wanted to reserve a table in a restaurant and said his name was Picasso. The girl replied "oh as in the Picasso car?"
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A very strange installation, a
refrigerator on a safe
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| Fridge and safe.... |
or a small sculture of Calder on a radiator of
the Calder brand. It looks more like a small fridge to me but apparently
it isn’t
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| The kiss merged into its fridge |
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| The kiss with its base |
Then of course there is the reference to Ready Made (Marcel Duchamp). The Salvado Dali and a kiss but on a freezer of course.... - the Guiletta or the crashed Alfa which Lavier went to retrieve from a scrap yard in 1993; with such a model, the car has nothing to do with its original concept - something has happened to it - a real emotion.
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| A crash NOT to be remebered |
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| An Alfa with a kiss |
That «kiss» we all know so well becomes very funny with Lavier’s «touch». It is practically erotic...
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| A happy but sad Ted |
And Teddy - that little bear mounted as a primitive object. Teddy has a long life history which we all know so well.
His interest in Africa too is surprising. There are various manufactured objects on pedestals - Ibo, Kingo, Nautiraid (the boat in the centre) , set out in quite a spectacular installation giving onto a tiled framing - I looked at it for a while. Of course, a sports ground.
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| IBO |
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| The full room |
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| KONGO |
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| METABO |
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| The sports ground in tiles..... |
The Papal Palace in tiny tiles - it could only be Paul Signac - I have never greatly appreciated pointillism and yet here, the picture became alive and those tiny tiles disappeared like the points in a picture when you stand away from it.
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| The Papal Palace |
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| From a Gobelins tapestry in neons |
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| An opening with Frank Stella? |
A tapestry but in actual fact a neon
painting but reproduced from a Gobelins tapestry....magic - even the
neon signs at the opening of the exhibition although
very familiar
seemed new. Don’t look at them with a fixed glare - you’ll go cross
eyed!
Perhaps Walt Disney production was a little less interesting for me. Hans Arp is certainly a great influence but it worked less than the room with a so called carpet and a magnificent wooden (?) statue behind.
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| Walt Disney Productions |
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| Very strong |
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| Could be a carpet and a wooden scultprue ? |
His work is alive. Undoubtedly, he is a major figure on the European art scene today - an avant-gardist for sure. I would think he loves life and can afford everything that goes with it.
From the 16th century to present day art can be a bit of a shock to the system but not only was it a shock, it was a very pleasant one. Bertrand Lavier certainly shakes up the most solid categories in the history of art. Crashed cars, African statues, Neons tubes looking not alike the American artist Frank Stella, Picasso. In actual fact it is the wing of the Picasso car. As an anecdote: one of the Picasso family recently wanted to reserve a table in a restaurant and said his name was Picasso. The girl replied "oh as in the Picasso car?"
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