Mathieu Briand
Et In Libertalia Ego. Vol. II
2 September 2015–11 July 2016
Museum of Old and New Art (MONA)
655 Main Road
Berriedale, Hobart
Tasmania
Australia
“It is simpler to make a montage of real events from which to create a fiction, than to film a fiction in order to make something real of it.”
–Mathieu Briand
In 2008 Mathieu Briand found himself on a small island off the coast of Madagascar. On this island, inhabited for generations by a Malagasy family, Briand initiated a project inviting a number of artists to create works in situ or send instructions for him to do so.
The project is called Et In Libertalia Ego, an allusion to the famous inscription Et in Arcadia Ego in Nicolas Poussin’s painting. The idea is to recreate Libertalia, the pirate’s utopia described in A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the Most Notorious Pyrates (1724), whose origins are an ambiguous mix of fiction and reality. The author’s name, Captain Johnson, may have been a pseudonym for Daniel Defoe, the author of Robinson Crusoe. The exhibition traces the different levels of the project, in a both poetic and documentary manner. At the core of Briand’s ambition are questions about the essence of art, the relationship between sacred and profane, between art and magic on the micro-cosmos of the island.
With a first iteration exhibited at La Maison Rouge in Paris, the exhibition now assumes a new form, on another island; cast off from the mainland of Australia and mired in its own dark history of colonialism. Et In Libertalia Ego Vol. II will be presented at the Museum of Old and New Art in Hobart, Tasmania, from 2 September 2015 to 11 July 2016.
Curated by Nicole Durling and Olivier Varenne, Mona’s exhibition expands upon the project’s manifestation by introducing the legendary Pitcairn Island and its inhabitants into the fold, continuing the artist’s exploration of the island as a creative laboratory of history and culture. In 2015 Briand will return to the island off Madagascar to reconnect with his family and friends and continue the Et In Libertalia Ego.
Artists invited by Mathieu Briand: Francis Alÿs, Les Frères Chapuisat, Sophie Dejode & Bertrand Lacombe, Jacin Giordano, Thomas Hirschhorn, Koo Jeong-A, Pierre Huyghe, Gabriel Kuri, Prue Lang, Richard Siegal, Juan Pablo Macias, Mike Nelson, Damián Ortega, Rudy Riccioti, Yvan Salomone
For more information: Rebecca Fitzgibbon, Events Media Manager, rebecca [at] mona.net.au