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MARIO MAURONER CONTEMPORARY VIENNA
Weihburggasse 26, 1010 Wien

Groundfloor & Basement: Jean Charles Blais "Simultaneous"

Opening: Thursday, March 17th, 2016, 6-9 pm

The comparison of works from different periods, which simultaneously work on different levels, is a common practice in the work of Jean Charles Blais. His work is informed by the diverse application of the medium, by using the couture as drawing or painting. With the help of digital media, billboards and other graphics emerge.
An earlier exhibition by Jean Charles Blais, which was shown in 1998 in the Bawag Foundation, already brought together two levels of his oeuvre. The series of works „sur mesure“ („Tailor-Made“) is half object and half sculpture. It creates a hypothetical wardrobe, which has been reduced to fragments and arranged on large black surfaces with paint and chalk. For his current exhibition in Vienna, Blais has expanded his body of work through the presentation of large format paintings, new cut and rearranged posters as well as gouache paintings. These new works fit into his figurative repertoire, whose fascination lies in the various layers of paper. It seems that the memory of forgotten forms, which were present in early works from the 80s, have been rediscovered. The polysemy arises through incessant metamorphoses, which play with the staging of the body and ambiguity. Forms are created, which arise from the concurrence of depth and surface – modern, unique, consistent and elusive.
And so the theme of this exhibition is the connection of these individual forms and their interaction. One looks for the empty forms, which emerge as memories of an absent body only to immediately disappear again.
Jean Charles Blais’ body of work abounds with art historical references, touching on the work of artists such as Henri Matisse, Kasimir Malevitsch and Philip Guston. He uses this as the basis to develop his own, distinctive artistic lexicon to portray the human body, which in his newest works in particular is emotionally deeply compelling. Paintings by Jean Charles Blais have recently been on show at the Cabinet d’art graphique, Centre Georges Pompidou Paris, at the Pinakothek der Moderne Munich, the Musée d’art moderne et d’art contemporain Nice, the CAPC Musée d’art contemporain Bordeaux, and the Musée Picasso in Antibes. The artist’s works can be found in several major collections, including the collections of the Museum of Modern Art New York, the Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, the Carré d’Art Nîmes, the CAPC Bordeaux, the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, the Musée National Monaco and the Centre Pompidou Paris.


At the project space AAA: GILBERT BRETTERBAUER - SALON
curated by Edelbert Köb
Opening: Thursday, April 14th, 2016, 6-9 pm
Duration of the exhibition: until May 28th, 2016

In the 1960's the multidisciplinary minimalist Donald Judd clarified in pragmatic terms the concept of interdisciplinary dialogues between art, architecture and design: If I make a sculpture, I am a sculptor; if I make a chair, a designer; if I make a house, an architect. However, his escape from the labyrinth of complex questions remains closed for many conceptual artists of the subsequent generation. Like Gilbert Bretterbauer, however, they operate explicitly in the space in between; even more, this in-between is their true artistic terrain.
In the last twenty years a remarkable Viennese scene has developed on this terrain around Franz West. West and the generation of Gilbert Bretterbauer, Peter Kogler, Gerwald Rockenschaub, Heimo Zobernig and others have not only intensely dealt with the shift in terminology between painting, sculpture, object and space, but also with the relationship between sculpture and functional object, as well as fine and applied arts. In addition to hybrid art objects, they designed - alone or in reciprocal cooperations - furniture, lamps and other objects of daily use. They arranged reading and quiet zones, bars, cafés and restaurants in the communicative in-between zones of cultural events, cooperated with architects and were in this way simultaneously initiators and participants of a trend.Their “art with practical value” as well as their specific analysis of the precarious relations between art and design brought diversity into the dull variety of high-end design.
Gilbert Bretterbauer represents the group in his generation that still adheres to the handmade, or at least that does not want to forgo this type of individual expression. Of course, he is also well acquainted with the computer and as a trained textile engineer, he knows all of the intricacies of textile production, which allows for, when necessary, the adequate implementation of his hand-painted and hand-drawn designs. In “Salon”, his reaction to the theme of “Grenzdialoge” (“Interdisciplinary Dialogues”), he confronts an industrial product with sculptural, hand-made furniture hybrids. The artist's interest in the psychedelic, in hippie culture as well as the Californian version of American daily culture, is visually consolidated here in an interior of ambivalent aesthetic and unique character.
Edelbert Köb