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Michel Rein: Didier Faustino, The wild things - 14 Apr 2011 to 28 May 2011 Current Exhibition |
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Didier Faustino, Instrument for blank architecture, 2010
Exhibition view at CAM Gulbenkian Lisbon, 2011, Picture Paulo Costa |
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Please scroll down for english version Didier Faustino, The wild things 14.04 - 28.05.2011 Vernissage jeudi 14 avril, 18h-21h Opening Thursday April 14, 6-9PM � Faire de l�architecture avec du sang, du poil, de la sueur et du sperme � C�est par cette d�claration, si ce n�est provocante, en tout cas inhabituelle, que Didier Faustino signait son entr�e dans le milieu professionnel de l�architecture. Et pour son dipl�me ; point de maquette, ni m�me de projet de b�timent mais un bodybuilder en train de soulever de la fonte, histoire de bien faire comprendre au jury la puissance de l�enveloppe charnelle humaine en tant que facteur d�terminant de notre environnement. Cette m�me image fera ensuite la une d�Art Press (1999) et ent�rinera son � adoption � par la sph�re de l�art contemporain. La porte du m�lange des genres �tait alors ouverte sans pour autant que Faustino ne se d�pare de son r�le d�architecte. Cette mise en exergue du corps l�entra�ne alors sur la voie de l�intime, des tabous, du rapport � l�autre qui, dans le contexte des ann�es 90, trouve un �cho chez certains activistes du droit � l��galit�. Sans pour autant chercher le militantisme, Faustino se voit accompagner des causes et choisit alors, sans compromis, l�outil le mieux adapt� au cahier des charges, se saisissant de la performance, de la vid�o, de l�objet ou de la construction pour �difier ce qui reste � ses yeux un discours d�architecture. Lui qui cite volontiers Vito Acconci et James Wines comme t�moins de ces allers-retours incessants entre pratiques cr�atives pour souligner que les cr�ateurs peuvent �chapper au principe de classification pr�d�finie. Sa production s�affirme alors � travers une multiplicit� de formes, souvent radicales, qui entretiennent le quiproquo chez l�observateur tandis que pour lui, les motivations restent celle d�un architecte en qu�te de narration et de fiction. Body in transit en 2000, soit un flight-case � design� � pour accueillir un passager clandestin ou bien encore la One Square Meter House , une tour de 17m de haut mais qui n�occupe qu�un m2 au sol, nous renvoie directement � cette r�flexion sur la probl�matique du corps dans la production d�un espace. Elles posent surtout la question suivante : jusqu�o� les exigences croissantes de la soci�t� contemporaine iront-t-elles dans ce mouvement de contrainte du corps. Et finalement, c�est souvent en dehors du petit monde de l�architecture que l�intention fait le plus vite mouche : des commanditaires priv�s pour ne pas dire des particuliers, le sollicitent pour imaginer des dispositifs � m�me de satisfaire leurs d�sirs hors norme. Ceux qu�une architecture trop standardis�e ne peut combler � moins que ce ne soit les modalit�s de la r�alit� qui les contraignent. De la m�me mani�re, la sph�re de l�art trouve chez Faustino un imaginaire qui pousse � bout les concepts, au point de ne plus faire de distinction entre une sculpture habitable et un habitat sculpt�. Ainsi de ce projet d�appartement � Beijing Home Palace (2004) o� le mobilier est remplac� par des lani�res tombant du plafond, ou de ces alc�ves � confidences (Zentral Nerven System, 2005-06) suspendues en tension par un jeu de sangles et install�es chez des collectionneurs d�art contemporain. Pour sa premi�re exposition � la galerie Michel Rein, Didier Faustino fait largement �merger le caract�re fictionnel de son discours. Fascin� par la litt�rature d�anticipation, celle de Philip K. Dick notamment, il y puise des artefacts qui l�aident � tirer l�architecture encore plus pr�s du dispositif narratif. Au centre de la galerie, l�installation Balance of Emptiness se compose de trois tr�pieds de g�om�tres qui portent chacun un casque, sorte d�isoloir dans lequel le public est invit� � venir plonger son visage. Point d�images mais une bande sonore qui d�livre en boucle l�interminable ritournelle : � Don�t trust architects �. Une remise en cause du statut m�me du cr�ateur qui transforme les visiteurs en acteurs malgr� eux d�une performance improbable g�n�r�e par cet objet intrigant. Et si une fiction en nourrissait une autre : Didier Faustino a collabor� avec l��crivaine Virginie Despentes dans la mise en �uvre de son prochain long-m�trage inspir� du roman Bye Bye Blondie. L�histoire raconte les retrouvailles de deux femmes, amies � l�adolescence, qui se retrouvent et deviennent amantes des ann�es plus tard. L�une d�cide de se cr�er un refuge dans l�espace m�me de l�appartement de l�autre. La microarchitecture devient alors le lieu d��change des deux femmes. En accord avec la r�alisatrice, Faustino a con�u ce � module � en se servant de plaques offset mises au rebut. Il livre ici les modalit�s du processus d��laboration � travers l��uvre Scramble Suit. Autre histoire : celle con�ue lors d�une invitation � un colloque organis� dans l�incroyable friche contemporaine qui abritait, il y a encore peu, � Tbilissi le minist�re des autoroutes. Didier Faustino propose de recomposer son projet Exploring Dead Buildings, cr�� de toutes pi�ces sur place, et qui consistait � partir dans l�exploration de l�architecture : un v�hicule sommaire, une vid�o� t�moins d�une action �ph�m�re. Sur un socle, l��uvre Hidden Pavillion renvoie clairement le spectateur au vocabulaire traditionnel de l�architecture. � moins que ce ne soit celui de la statuaire. Une maquette qui n�en est pas une, sculpt�e dans un bloc de marbre, rassemble trois mod�les architectoniques fondateurs. Enfin, The wild thing, trous de ver mod�lis�s en feuillard de ch�taigniers et flottant dans le volume de la galerie s�inscrivent dans la suite d�un projet initi� au CCA de Kitakuyshu au Japon avec des artisans experts du bambou. Autre lieu, autre technique, autre culture� De l�absurdit� de fabriquer une reproduction math�matique � l�aide de produits naturels si ce n�est pour mieux jouer du "trium viral" cher � Faustino : art, artisanat, architecture. Olivier Reneau -------------- "Doing architecture with blood, hear, sweat and sperm" It is with this declaration, if not provocative, then certainly unusual, that Didier Faustino signaled his entry into the professional sphere of architecture. For his final degree presentation there was no question of him presenting a model, or a project for a building. He presented a bodybuilder lifting cast iron, showing the jury the power of the mortal coil as a dominating factor in the space which surrounds us. This same image was used for the front cover of Art Press (1999) and hailed Faustino's "adoption" by the contemporary art world. By putting an emphasis on the body in all its intimacy, in the 90s Faustino's work found itself echoed by certain equal rights activists. Without searching to be a militant, Faustino found himself carried along by these causes and used performance, video, design and construction to edify, what remained for him, a question of architecture. He voluntarily sites Vito Acconci and James Wines as insertions for this bouncing between creative practices, to underline that those that create can escape being definitively pigeonholed. His work testifies this. Using a multiplicity of forms, often radical, he develops an exchange with the observer whilst his motives remain those of an architect, looking for narration and fiction. Both Body in Transit , a flight-case to smuggle a person, and One Square Meter House , a 17m tower with only one m2 of floor space, directly show us the artist's preoccupation with the body when producing space. They also make us question how far the growing demands in the society will go to constrain the body. In the end it is often outside of the small world of architecture that his intentions succeed: private backers, approach him to imagine installation for them and to realise their unusual dreams. A more standardised architect could not satisfy these desires unless they were based in reality. In this same way, the art world has found in Faustino an imagination which pushes concepts to such a limit that we can no longer make the distinction between an habitable sculpture or a sculptured habitat. This is also to be seen in his apartment project in Beijing Home Palace (2004) where the furniture was replaces by a system of straps hanging from the ceiling and in his confiding alcoves (Zentral Nerven System, 2005-06) suspended by straps and installed into the spaces of contemporary art collectors. For his first exhibition at the Galerie Michel Rein, Didier Faustino plays greatly with the fictional aspect of his work. Fascinated by science fiction literature, notably the work of Philip K. Dick, he draws heavily on the artifacts that allow him to link architecture more and more into the fictional narrative. At the centre of the gallery, the installation Balance of emptiness made up of a land surveyor's tripod holds three helmets, mini isolation booths into which the public are invited to plunge their faces. They are not faced with any images but a sound track repeating the line "Don't Trust Architects". The makes us reconsider even his status as creator, as he changes his visitors into actors, and creates and unusual performance triggered by these intriguing objects. And if one fiction fed another: Didier Faustino collaborated with the writer Virginie Despentes in the production of her new feature film inspired by the novel Bye Bye Blondie. Two women, old teenage friends, find each other in later life and become lovers. One decides to create a refuge in the apartment of the other. Working with the director, Faustino created this "module" using discarded sheet metal. In this exhibition he charts his creative process. Another story: this one developped following an invitation to a conference organized in the incredible contemporary wasteland in Tbilisi, which, until recently, held the motorway ministry. Didier Faustino created the project Exploring dead buildings on site which allowed people to explore the architecture: a rough vehicle, a video� witnesses of a short-lived action. On a stand, the artwork Hidden Pavillion sends the visitor straight back to the traditional vocabulary of architecture. A model which isn't a model, sculpted from a bloc of marble, gathers together three founding architectural motifs. Finally, The wild thing, wormholes made from stripped branches of chestnut trees, floating in the gallery space, follow on from a project started in Japan with professional bamboo craftsmen. Another place, another technique, another culture� From this absurdity of creating a mathematical reproduction with the aid of natural produces we clearly see the trinity of Faustino's work: art, craftsmanship and architecture. Olivier Reneau GALERIE MICHEL REIN 42 rue de Turenne - F-75003 Paris tel +33 1 42 72 68 13 fax +33 1 42 72 81 94 [email protected] http://www.michelrein.com gallery artists: Sa�dane Afif, Maria Thereza Alves, Maja Bajevic, Jean-Pierre Bertrand, Jordi Colomer, Jimmie Durham, Didier Fiuza Faustino, Dora Garcia, Mathew Hale, Jean-Charles Hue, Armand Jalut, Yuri Leiderman, Didier Ma |
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