Folkert de Jong
A Life of Illusions
July 5–September 15, 2013
Eduardo T. Basualdo
Inverse
June 26–September 15, 2013
Waiting Time. Selections from the Museum’s Collection
and
Raoul Hausmann: Portraits. Selections from the Raoul Hausmann Collection (1886–1971)
March 1–September 15, 2013
Musée départemental d’art contemporain de Rochechouart
87 600, Rochechouart, France
Hours: Wednesday–Monday 10–12:30h, 13.30–18h
T + 33 (0)5 55 03 77 77
contact.musee [at] cg87.fr
This summer the Musée départemental d’art contemporain de Rochechouart presents the first exhibition in a French museum by Dutch artist Folkert de Jong. His famous life-size sculptures will be shown in the castle’s wood-beamed top-floor gallery space.
Folkert de Jong (b. 1972) lives and works in Amsterdam. Over the last 15 years he has gained a reputation for his dramatic sets of sculptures that combine grotesque and monumental features. The polystyrene foam figures tinted with bright colors are assembled in scenes that, despite references to historical sculptures, remain difficult to situate with their mutated and anarchic punk forms. Misappropriating industrial polyurethane and polystyrene foam plastic, Folkert de Jong manages to express a whole gamut of human emotions in work that is varied yet never entirely what it seems to be. However ephemeral and frothy his sculptures appear, the plastic he uses is tragically neither biodegradable nor recyclable but, paradoxically, far more permanent than traditional bronze.
For Rochechouart Museum’s exhibition Folkert de Jong. Une vie d’illusions / A Life of Illusions, the artist has reconstructed scenes from four previous figurative sculptural ensembles and drawings made since 2003. Spectators are confronted head-on with life-sized figures whose semi-realistic arrangements are constantly undermined by violent colors and quasi-grotesque expressions on the borderline of being inhuman. The result is strangely compelling and disturbing, like a fairground distorting mirror reflecting the world around us. Inspired by Picasso’s Saltimbanques, which he reinterpreted in 2007, the street entertainer’s laughter is tinged with sadness and the whole carnival atmosphere oscillates between joy and tears, comedy and tragedy—life and life’s accomplishments being nothing but an illusion.
Folkert de Jong’s work has been shown in many places around the world over the last few years including a major retrospective at the Groninger Museum (Netherlands, 2009) and a one-man show in the Mackintosh Museum at Glasgow’s School of Art (Scotland, 2012). In France, he participated in the Lille 3000 Fantastic 2012 exhibition last winter and in 2013, some of his works have be seen at the Portland Art Museum, Oregon, USA (5 January–23 June, 2013) and some are currently shown at the Museum of Modern Art (MUDAM) in Luxembourg (Actus Tragicus, 23 March 2012–8 September 2013).
Eduardo T. Basualdo. Inverse
Inverse and Los Fantasmas (Phantoms), created by Eduardo T. Basualdo (b. 1977) for his show Nervio at Rochechouart Museum last spring, will be on display until 15 September 2013.
A dark streak of surrealism runs through many of the Argentinian artist’s mysterious works that are steeped in theatre, literary and psychoanalysis roots. Recurring themes such as ambiguity of natural forms and the impact of physical forces often coalesce. Visitors are confronted with the physical presence of a gigantic black rock (Inverse), are allowed to enter and leave a cell Los Fantasmas (Phantoms).
A catalogue (in French, English and Spanish) edited by Annabelle Ténèze and published by Analogues Press (Arles, France) is the first monographic text to be edited on the artworks of Eduardo Basualdo.
Waiting Time. Selection from the Museum’s Collection
Adam Adach, Giovanni Anselmo, Douglas Gordon, Roger Hiorns, Pierre Huyghe, Jannis Kounellis, Guillaume Leblon, Arnaud Maguet, Katie Paterson, Gustav Metzger, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Anne and Patrick Poirier, Sigmar Polke, Kiki Smith, Jana Sterbak, Patrick Tosani, Jeff Wall
This new presentation of the collections focuses on the human and universal experience of time. Testifying to the historical event, fighting against life’s fatal end, have always been at the core of artistic creation. Contemporary photography and video have changed the time of the work, now ranging from the instantaneous to the nearly infinite.
Raoul Hausmann: Portraits. Selection from the Raoul Hausmann Collection (1886-1971)
Through the lens of portraiture, the exhibition will explore the diversity of the Dadaist Raoul Hausmann’s artistic practices—paintings, photographs, drawings, collages and photomontages. It will as well focus on his relation to the body and the performance.
The Musée départemental d’art contemporain de Rochechouart is an initiative of the Conseil général de la Haute-Vienne. The exhibition program was made possible through the support of the French Minister of Culture (DRAC Limousin). The exhibition Folkert de Jong. A Life of Illusions is supported by Mondriaan Funds (Netherlands).
