11th Biennale de Lyon
A Terrible Beauty Is Born /
Une Terrible Beauté Est Née
15 September–31 December 2011
Preview:
13–14 September 2011
Curator: Victoria Noorthoorn
Artistic Director: Thierry Raspail
Preview registration:
www.labiennaledelyon.com/art-contemporain
1. Imagination is the primary medium of knowledge.
2. Imagination allows for the rational and the irrational to coexist productively.
3. Imagination is the primary force for emancipation.
4. A Terrible Beauty Is Born, a verse from the poem Easter, 1916 by William Butler Yeats that gives the title to this Biennale, brings together two apparent opposites. We are interested in this structure of productive contradiction.
5. This Biennale intends to address a state of confusion in the arts today, where art is conceived primarily as a commodity in the economic market.
6. This exhibition does not chronicle; it distinguishes between art and journalism.
7. It also distinguishes between art and communication. We resist the notion of the need to explain dense materials. If texts are to appear in the Biennale, or the catalogue, they will be artworks in themselves, not external explanatory texts.
8. With W.J.T. Mitchell, we ask what the images and works in this exhibition want and do. We intend to signal the power of the image, one that may drastically alter an established order.
9. We are not interested in the representation of the political, nor do we intend to enact the political. Such desires would be redundant.
10. The 11th Biennale de Lyon is being conceived from Buenos Aires, in South America, for and with Lyon. The artists in the exhibition have been selected as individuals and not as representatives of their countries of origin or regions.
11. The 11th Biennale de Lyon has the ambition to be alive. If it could be considered an animal or a beast, it would choose to be so. If it can be at war with itself, it will attempt to do so.
The 11th Biennale de Lyon will include around 70 artists from around the globe, primarily from Europe, Africa and Latin America.
The Biennale’s catalogue is conceived as an editorial, autonomous work—rather than as a representation of the Biennale per se.
Victoria Noorthoorn
Invited artists (as of 10th May 2011):
Gabriel Acevedo Velarde; Ayreen Anastas & Rene Gabri; The Arctic Perspective Initiative; Zbynek Baladran; Ernesto Ballesteros; Lenora de Barros; Hannah Van Bart; Eduardo Basualdo; Samuel Beckett & Daniela Thomas; Erick Beltrán; Diego Bianchi; Guillaume Bijl; Pierre Bismuth; Arthur Bispo do Rosário; Katinka Bock; Ulla von Brandenburg; Fernando Bryce; François Bucher; John Cage; Augusto de Campos; Marina de Caro; Center for Historical Reenactments; Virginia Chihota; Robbie Cornelissen; Julien Discrit; Marlene Dumas; Morton Feldman; Robert Filliou; Stano Filko; Aurélien Froment; Alberto Giacometti; Milan Grygar; Joana Hadjithomas & Khalil Joreige; Arturo Herrera; Michel Huisman; Jessica Hutchins; Yun-Fei Ji; Christoph Keller; Lúcia Koch; Eva Kotátkova; Robert Kusmirowski; Luciana Lamothe; Moshekwa Langa; Ruth Laskey; Kemang Wa Lehulere; Christian Lhopital; Laura Lima; Jarbas Lopes; Jorge Macchi; Cildo Meireles; Laurent Montaron; Bernardo Ortiz; The Otolith Group; Sarah Pierce; José Alejandro Restrepo; Tracey Rose; Alexander Schellow; Gabriel Sierra; Elly Strik; Neal Tait; Javier Téllez; Barthélémy Toguo; Erika Verzutti; Judi Werthein; Lynette Yiadom-Boakye; Héctor Zamora.
For additional press & professional information and inquiries:
www.labiennaledelyon.com/art-contemporain
