Category Archives: Paris

Mr. & Pharrell Williams ‘Call to Action’ (Paris)

July 21, 2019 butterfly

The Guimet National Museum of Asian Arts (MNAAG) in Paris, home to the largest collection of Asian arts in Europe, gave ‘Carte Blanche’ to a site-specific installation created by Japanese contemporary artist Mr. and curated by Pharrell Williams : it’s a ‘Call to Action’.

Located on the fourth-floor rotunda beneath the dome of the main Guimet building, the exhibition runs until September 23, 2019. The project started five years ago based on an idea by Pharrell Williams–who is a self-proclaimed fan of Mr.’s work. The result of this long standing collaboration is an installation of bright, child-like figures sporting a military aesthetic while some carry firearms: the duo emphasizes the importance of younger generations in a world tormented by adult choices.

Pharrell Williams commented: “Kids run the world and this work is a challenge to leaders to do something immediately – for a better, bright future.”

Featuring painting, sculptures and neon signs, Mr. invites the viewer into an immersive pastel coloured world, which aims to represent a positive and peaceful momentum in finding solutions for today’s problems. “Amid the tension and crisis of uncertainty that we live in today, we need to believe in the hope that can be found in children, and take inspiration on the promise of their optimistic outlook and spirit. Kids have the power. With art, we start this dialogue in this way” says Mr.

The toy-looking rifles do not symbolise violence literally, but militance. Children’s best weapon, to be protected at all costs, is their creativity and imagination.

View the full set of pics here

Carte Blanche to Mr. & Pharell Williams
A Call to Action
Musee National des Arts Asiatiques – Guimet
6 Place Iena, Paris
Until 25 September 2019

Paris, Shows

Paris: Jean-Michel Othoniel ‘Oracles’

March 17, 2019 butterfly

Galerie Perrotin presents a new solo show of French contemporary artist Jean-Michel Othoniel in Paris, following several important personal exhibitions in Canada, USA and France in 2018.

Jean-Michel Othoniel’s enchanting aesthetics revolves around the notion of emotional geometry. Using the repetition of modular elements such as bricks or his signature beads, which are his most recurring motif, he creates exquisite jewelry-like sculptures whose relationship to human scale ranges from intimacy to monumentality

The exhibition entitled ‘Oracles’ brings together fifteen minimalistic, enigmatic sculptures made of glass or metal bricks, the artist has systematized the use of a module that entered his work in 2009, after a journey to India. On the road from Delhi to Firozabad, a city with an age-old glassmaking tradition, he was struck by the stacks of bricks accumulated in the hope of building a house and by the countless altars covered in offerings and multicoloured necklaces. Since then, he has called on the knowledge of Indian glassblowers to blow blue, amber, yellow and grey glass bricks.

Monumental yet delicate, the sculptural installations allow the viewers to inhabit his world through reflection and motion.

Jean Michel Othoniel - Oracles

View the full set of pics here

Jean Michel Othoniel – Oracles
Until 8 June 2019
Galerie Perrotin, Paris

London, Paris

Banksy News

February 2, 2019 butterfly

Three major headlines related to Banksy

London: Banksy enters the permanent collection of the British Museum

The British Museum in London has acquired its first work by the anonymous artist, a fake £10 banknote depicting Lady Diana, Princess of Wales, which will join its collection of coins, medals and other currency.
The work, entitled Di-faced Tenner, was one of thousands of copies produced by the artist in 2004 as part of a planned art performance. Unlike ‘Peckham Rock’, a fake cave painting on concrete , which was part of a 2005 stunt and loaned again to the museum for a recent exhibition on dissent and protest in 2018 (see our coverage here), the note has been donated to the museum by the artist’s representative Pest Control.

It is the only official banknote ever released by Banksy. Any other kind of currency note are simply NOT by the artist, so fans and buyers beware. And the Banksy Di-Face Tenner indicates on its back ‘Trust No One’.

Palestine: Banksy creates a new artwork at the Walled Off Hotel

Two years after the official opening his artivist hotel in Bethlehem, Banksy just revealed a new artwork inside the Walled Off Hotel.

Conveying a message of Love and Peace, the artwork depicts a little veiled girl playing with coloured 3d block shapes looking at a giant heart shaped hole in a concrete wall which shows a neon light blue sky. Looking closer the 3D block shapes on the floor are iconographic symbols of all monotheist religions, from the cross to the start and crescent. Messages of peace are graffitied on the wall while Banksy’s signature is engraved in the concrete.

Paris: Banksy’s tribute to Bataclan’s victims is stolen

Sadly less than seven months after Banksy painted his tribute on the fire-exit door of the Bataclan theatre, where Islamist militants killed 90 people three years ago, the artwork has been stolen, the venue has said.
The work, one of a series of murals during Banksy’s invasion of the French capital last June, showed a veiled female figure in a mournful pose. ( Check our initial coverage about the artwork here)
“We are today filled with a deep sense of indignation. The work of Banksy, a symbol of contemplation belonging to all – residents, Parisians and citizens of the world – has been taken from us,” the Bataclan said in a Twitter post. A police investigation continues.

Stay tuned for further updates

Paris

Paris: André x Futura – Chez Nous

January 21, 2019 butterfly

André & Futura have joined forces for a unique collaborative show at Danysz Gallery in Paris with their signature pictorial characters. Aptly entitled André x Futura – Chez Nous, the show presents a series of unseen works where they answer each other and merge their energetic painterly gestures. Futura (whose real name is Lenny McGurr) otherworldly characters, such as the Pointman, echo Saraiva’s Mr A. whimsical dancing figures, as if their pictorial alter ego were enjoying themselves as much as both artists did in this adventure.

View the full set of pics here

André x Futura – Chez Nous
Until 9 February 2019
Magda Danysz Gallery, 78 rue Amelot, Paris

Art Fair, Paris

Paris: FIAC Highlights 2018

October 20, 2018 butterfly

Two weeks after FRIEZE in London, Paris attracts the center of the art world for a week with FIAC (Foire Internationale d’Art Contemporain).

Located in the spectacular venue of the Grand Palais, the 45th edition of FIAC featured 195 galleries from 27 countries. The five-day fair, held in the majestic setting of the Grand Palais, combines contemporary and modern art under one soaring steel-and-glass roof, and attracts about 75,000 visitors, according to the organizers. The Frieze and Frieze Masters fairs, which separate contemporary and modern, each attract 60,000.

Here are some highlights from this year’s edition