Art Of The Day Weekly
#516 - from 24 May 2018 to 30 May 2018
Guerrier du Congo, engraving in etching and water color, 20.1 x 14.7 x 0.1 cm © musée du quai Branly - Jacques Chirac.
IN THE AIR
Explorer, a child’s dream
PARIS – René Caillié, disguised as a Touareg, finally reaching Tombouctou, courageous Brazza burnt away by fever, Cook eaten as a sandwich by the savage inhabitants in Hawai, La Pérouse sinking in Vanikoro. These and so many others peopled our dreams of far away regions, from Siam to Dahomey, from Abyssinia to Patagonia. These are actually the dreams of our parents and grand parents. The iconography Roger Boulay brought together reflects a time when there was no TV, no Internet, where drawings were stronger than photographs. It shows how the imagination of children was fed by bombastic illustrations, often not precise but it remains the myth of the good White man and the naïve black man, the yellow traitor, and the Gaucho on his horse day and night. Books, posters, engravings, dioramas, adventure stories including a surprising array with an obvious nostalgic power.
• Le Magasin des petits explorateurs at the musée du quai Branly, from 23 May to 7 October 2018.
EXHIBITIONS
Roger Parry, Untitled, ca 1929. Photomontage : silver gelatin glued on cardboard; 19,9 × 14,7 cm. Centre Pompidou, Mnam-CCI, Paris. Purchase made possible by sponsorship of Yves Rocher, 2011. Former collection Christian Bouqueret. Photo © Centre Pompidou, MNAM-CCI, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais.
The ABC of the UAM
PARIS – The term “French style Bauhaus” is very efficient and not really usurped. The UAM- the Union of modern artists was a true creative plant which combined all disciplines, from architects – such as Le Corbusier, Mallet-Stevens - designers (Prouvé, Perriand), painters (the Delaunay spouses), to sculptors (the Martel), glassmakers (Barillet) and book binders (Legrain); from poster artists (Colin) to ceramic artists. The adventure was founded in 1929, encouraged by annual conventions, akin to the Front populaire, the adventure slowly withered following the war. From Rose Adler to Jean-Michel Zevaco, putting forward a few significant samples (villa Savoye by Le Corbusier, Chareau’s Maison de verre, a deckchair by Eileen Gray, or a piece of silver by Puiforcat), the retrospective pays a tribute to this surprising melting pot – an ideal that is to be updated at a time when the way of functioning in silos, seems to impose itself automatically.
• UAM, une aventure moderne at the Centre Pompidou, from 30 May to 27 August 2018.
Wiener Werkstätte, Postcard No. 251 with portrait of Otto Wagner, Vienna, 1911 © MAK.
Wagner, the other one
VIENNA – Otto Wagner is the grandfather of the Viennese modernist. Like most of the geniuses of the 1900 - Klimt, Schiele, Hoffman, Moser- he died in 1918 but was the only one to have reached a respectable age (77 years old). This is what probably explains that his influence was a spread out and lasting. While none of his buildings are as famous as the Secession pavilion with its dome in gold leaf (Olbrich’s work), he built relentlessly, from the Karlsplatz station of the metropolitan to the church of Steinhof, from the lock of the Pavilion (on the Danube), to the Post Office Savings Bank. This emblematic building, which had maintained until recently its initial function, shall be re-configured as a hotel or a prestigious residence. The exhibition underlines Wagner’s capacity to integrate the latest technical progresses, and draws up an ideal portrait of its disciples, including Max Fabiani and Karl Plecnik.
• Post-Otto Wagner. From the Postal Savings Bank to Post-Modernism at the MAK, from 30 May to 30 September 2018.
Folon, also a photographer
LA HULPE (Belgium) – The public at large seems to think of Jean-Michel Folon (1934-2005) only as a poster artist, an illustrator. Actually, due to his curiosity and the friendship he built with persons such as Cartier-Bresson, Giorgio Soavi or André Villers, he also delved into photography. The exhibition shows he also had a very personal way of looking at things, and, like in his drawings, he showed more tenderness than criticism.
• Folon Photos graphiques, at the Fondation Folon, from 26 May to 25 November 2018
BOOKS
Photo yes, or photo no?
Inspired by the perfect title chosen by Naomi Klein (No Logo), the author expresses a timely way of thinking about photography, the way of using it, its sense. He himself is a photographer, but not only. He is also an agronomist, and a specialist in musical bars, which we can see as we turn the pages, and as we think of his personal experiences or places long gone such as the Limonaire in Paris. He reviews all the enormous changes of this medium. Digital photography, and the explosion in the number of snapshots (which each year are counted in thousands of billions – where do they end up?), the obsession of the selfie (the business of making sticks for selfies can be very profitable) are some of the chapters looked into with a necessary touch of irony, which becomes more serious when we know under what conditions these cameras that have become our appendices are made. Just like a book about the truth concerning meat can take away the taste of a good stew, this book could almost push us to stop taking photos. Actually, the author pushes us to further moderation– we must learn to slow down – and we know it is not easy as is proven by the heated debate on the 80 km/h speed limit in France.
• No Photo, by Pierrick Bourgault, Dunod publishing house, 176 p., €12.90.
OPENINGS OF THE WEEK
HAROLD FEINSTEIN
24 May 2018 - PARIS - Galerie Thierry Bigaignon
The best interpreter ever of Coney Island
IN BRIEF
PARIS - The Paris Gallery Weekend will be held on 26 and 27 May 2018.
PARIS – The macparis fair will be held from 22 to 27 May 2018.
TOKYO – The Tokyo International Art Fair will be held on 25 and 26 May 2018.
VENICE – The Biennale of architecture will be held from 26 May to 25 November 2018.