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Five new exhibitions at the Maison Européenne de la Photographie

Image: Maison Européenne de la Photographie.

Text: Rooksana Hossenally.

The Maison Européene de la Photographie (MEP) is one of those key venues that is internationally renowned for showing work by high-profile photographers. And this week was no exception with the launch of five brand new exhibitions. If you’re going to be in the area it’s worth popping in to see William Ropp’s stunning portraits. But the other works on show, including Götz Göppert’s panoramic night shots of Paris, Dominique Isserman’s Laetitia Casta, Youssef Nabil’s Egyptian mise-en-scènes and the series, Eloges du vertige, might leave you feeling somewhat underwhelmed.

The four floors are divided up between the five photographers’ work. From top to bottom: Eloges du vertige and Youssef Nabil, followed by Isserman and the second part of Eloges du vertige on the next floor, then Ropp on first and Götz Göppert in the basement.

Musée Condé - Château de Chantilly

Text Lilliane Milgrom, Self-portrait by Ingres

Renowned for its cream, lace and horse racing, Chantilly is a picturesque little town just 25 minutes by train from the center of Paris. Its pride and joy is the Château de Chantilly, where the noblesse oblige once frolicked, feasted and hunted. Until the French Revolution that is. The original building was destroyed by revolutionary mobs and the impressive chateau that stands in its place today was rebuilt in the 1870s by Henri d’Orleans, duc d’Aumale. André le Notre (creator of the Versailles gardens) designed the classically groomed landscape surrounding the estate. Altogether a beautiful sight.

However, the Château de Chantilly is more than a lavish historic site. Its art gallery, the Musée Condé, houses one of the finest collections of classical paintings in France, after the Louvre. During his lifetime, the duc d’Aumale amassed an impressive collection of European paintings and book illuminations concentrated on the 15^th and 16^th centuries. Upon his death his collection and estate passed to the Institut Français with the stipulation that it be open to the public, and that the original placement of the artworks remain untouched. That explains a lot. When entering the first and largest of the galleries, the sight of eighty paintings displayed frame-to-frame from floor to ceiling is rather overwhelming.

Art Forces Merge at Lille’s LaM

Text by Aran Cravey  Photomontage : R. Truffaut

Modern, contemporary, and outsider art merge in Lille, at the reopening of their Métropole Museum. After an extensive four year renovation and under a new title, Lille Métropole Musée d'art moderne, d'art contemporain et d'art brut, or LaM, as it is more efficiently known, will reopen its doors as one of the only European museums to exhibit all three of art’s major components from the 20^th and 21^st century.

Created initially to house the collection donated by Jean et Geneviève Masurel in 1979, the museum’s original space was designed by Roland Simounet and situated within an expansive sculpture park, where it remains today. The organic elements of its natural surroundings played a significant role in architect Manuelle Gautrand’s design for the museum’s new expansion.

With its fresh renovations and additional exhibition space, the museum can now facilitate its nearly 4,500-piece collection. Along with the significant number of works from early 20^th century masters such as Pablo Picasso, Joan Miró and Amedeo Modigliani, the museum has also amassed an impressive collection of contemporary art, including works by Christian Boltanski, Annette Messager, and Dennis Oppenheim, to name a few. Although, it was upon the generous donation of the L’Aracine association (an outsider art foundation) in 1999, a gift that included the largest collection of outsider art in the country that the museum’s directors decided to extend the focus of the institution.

Maison Rouge: Home is Where the Art Is

Text: Aran Cravey

With over a hundred museums, Paris is the undisputed capital of artistic institutions. And while it can boast more than it's fair share of publicly funded, pillars of art history, it's contemporary art funding lags far behind it's foreign competitors. Which is why entrepreneur and contemporary art enthusiast, Antoine de Galbert has taken it upon himself to build his a foundation dedicated to not only the exhibition and funding of living artists, but to the dialogue between creative minds from various nations, genres and political points of view. As a professional dealer and private collector, de Galbert understood the complexities of the contemporary art world and saw a need for a galvanizing force between its polarizing sectors.

In 2000, Maison Rouge was founded as a forum for creative discussion of all varieties of artistic creation. As a privately funded foundation, Maison Rouge has the freedom to encourage emerging artists and allow for experimentation in it's exhibition program. Dedicated to artistic collaborations and cultural exchange, Maison Rouge presents three distinctly different exhibitions this summer that provide a fresh perspective on the other.

Lining the walls of the inner gallery, Jean de Maximy's ink drawn frieze invites guests into a metaphysical morphic reality. Upon venturing further, viewers will discover other distant realms and one of the lesser explored aspects of founder Antoine de Galbert's collection. The 400 headdresses and ceremonial ornaments in this presentation served a practical purpose in the cultures from which they originated. The presence of these indigenous cultural artifacts in this contemporary artistic venue adds a global and historical juxtaposition to the space's modernity.

Musée des Arts Décoratifs

Text: Tiffany Tang
Photo: Bathroom designed by Armand Albert Rateau

Situated in Louvre’s nineteenth-century Rohan and Marsan wings is the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, a museum of decorative art and design that houses over 150,000 objects, showcasing collections of antiquities and modern designs from the Middle Ages to the present day. The collections encompass a vast diversity of decorative objects including furniture, tableware, carpets, stained glass, wallpaper and porcelain.   This diversity is a testament to the quintessence of the French art of living from the ancient times, as well as sophistication in craftsmanship and creativity.

Nuit des Musées 2009

Saturday the 16th the May from 6pm to Midnight, Paris' museums are opening their doors for free. Each museum will propose a different program.

Young visitors to the Pompidou Centre will be invited to explore alexander Calder’s art during a workshop in conjunction with Calder’s exhibition “What a circus!”; a digital fresco, interactive and moving, will gradually invade the facade of the musée des Beaux-arts de Valenciennes.

Force de l’art 02, the second triennial event organised by the French ministry of Culture and Communication, showcasing France’s diverse contemporary art scene will exceptionally open the doors of the grand palais.

Space, so Far, so Close, a special program proposed by the Centre national d'etudes spatiales, will offer unusual insights on a number of artworks in several museums throughout France.

Search participating museums by city and themes here.

ARTYDANDY

ARTYDANDY, a gallery newly opened in St Germain, offers a selection of art books & magazines, surprising fashion accessories and decorative design objects.

Sublime, kitsch, baroque, graphic or political, the objects are neither tools defined by their function nor necessities of modern life, but “a social metaphor” as Ettore Sottssas has once said about Design.

ARTYDANDY aims to unite these unique contemporary pieces in an exclusive location. New exclusive drawings to be discovered every week at the gallery and online.

William Blake Retrospective at Petit Palais

The British poet, painter, and "Romantic visionary" is now at the Petit Palais through June 28th, 2009.

William Blake : le génie visionnaire au Petit Palais

No Good Store

Founded in January 2000, No Good Industry is a collective of artists, who publish books (No Good Editions), run a café (No Good Café), carry a music label (No Good Music) and a line of furniture (No Good Design). The list goes on...

Located in - what they now call - SoPi (south of Pigalle), the No Good Store is a concept store, somewhere between an art gallery and a clothing store, where all objects and garments are considered art, where everything is in limited edition, and everything is for sale.

No Good Store
53 rue des Martyrs
75009 Paris

Byzance Home

Adrian K. Sanders writing for I V Y paris

Paris doesn't have the young fervor of Berlin, nor the cut-throat pace of London and New York but it does have a very distinct appreciation for art that is proving to have real staying power in spite of the current market Armageddon.

Parisians love beautiful things. The tradition of decorative arts seen in Rococo, Art Nouveau and Modernist architecture and the fierce pride of fashion and design boutiques throughout the city are testaments to all things lovely.

Art as a decorative object doesn't carry as much of the stigma here in Paris as in other cities. The pure aesthetic enjoyment of an art piece holds an important place in the mind's eye of the Paris citizen.

Collectible value, artistic integrity and practical function appeal to a conservative and relatively small market that still has strong purchase power and we may see more conversion happening between design and contemporary art if this trend develops.

The possibility of stepping away from the great white wall and onto the stage of a home or office is an exciting frontier, not just for decorative art, but for everything else as well.A boutique store like Byzance Home offers a compelling example of the collision between art and design that makes the case for decorative art, and perhaps other forms as well.