Robert Barry, Bernard Bazile, On Kawara, Leigh Ledare, Martha Wilson - Art Genève - Art fairmfc-michèle didier | Paris - Brussels -

ART GENÈVE 2020
January 30 - February 2,2020
Geneva, Switzerland


The mfc-michèle didier gallery is pleased to announce its participation in the next edition of ArtGenève, which will take place from January 30 to February 2, 2020. Bringing together 5 artists of different generations articulating a certain relationship between geometry and a form of sensuality, it presents a body of works that can be seen as a form of fetishism, in their precision, the concept that underlies them or by their frontal address to sexuality.

Bazile's 3615 collection lets us catch a glimpse of an erotic desire exposed in plain sight, treated on the same level than other mass markets products. It's interesting to focus on this phenomenon, which is unimaginable today, at a time so sensitive when it deals with women bodies' objectification. If our virtual relationships keep an inclination towards consumption, through online dating services or pornographic websites, it remains strictly private. The public aspect of Bazile's collection questions our stereotypes about the supposed open-mindedness of our 21st century society. 

Martha Wilson applies permutation, a practice so dear to the conceptual artists of the 1960s and 1970s, to one of the most fetishized aspects of the female anatomy: the breasts. In Breast Forms Permutated the artist, mocking the tendency to control the female body and establish universal standards of feminine beauty, Wilson places the "perfect set" at the center of her grid of 9 images of breasts.

Double Bind is a set of 3 volumes and 10 photographs Baryta paper. The project is built based on a protocol established by the artist Leigh Ledare : he organized two three-day work sessions, two months apart. The first session documents the encounter between the artist and his ex- wife, Meghan Ledare-Fedderly, in a hotel room in New York?s countryside. For the second session, Meghan returned to the same place with her current husband, the photographer Adam Fedderly. During these two sessions, 742 photographs were taken by Leigh Ledare and Adam Fedderly and trace the course of the days, reflecting the couple?s intimacy from each husband?s perspective. 

Three works by Robert Barry will be presented on the stand as part of this project. 

Art Lovers i an unbound book , and each plate of it superimposes two layers: a photographic portrait taken by the artist himself and a word outline cut into a black surface. The portrait is covered by the black layer and the frame of shape of the word creates a fragmented portrait seen through a keyhole. In Art Lovers, there is a great mystery and obscurity by the indistinguishable, vague elements. It is up to the viewer to infer their subjects and reconstitute the portraits based on sparse and vague elements. The 31 ?Art Lovers? in question were photographed by Robert Barry himself. One Billion Colored Dots consists of 25 volumes and counts one billion colored dots at the rate of 40.000.000 dots per volume and 4.000 dots per page. The work is printed in as many colors as there are volumes: each volume has its own color. The accumulation of dots is oriented towards the edification of sense. Quantity constitutes the work. Following his own compositional method devised in 1969, Barry has created a collection of twenty-four sets, each made up of three parts, which respectively contain a statement. The two primary statements are repeated in each set, whereas the third is one of twenty-four possibilities, creating just as many possible combinations. While using, playing with, staging and questioning words, the statements from Somethings that? are unique in that they never conjure up an image. Although the combinations of words hold meaning and are grammatically correct, no visual transcription arises in the reader?s mind: the thought remains textual and evolves as such.

Finally, One Million Years which is an edition réalised by On Kawara and mfc michele didier in 1999. L The first volume, Past ? For all those who have lived and died, starts in 998031 BC and ends in 1969 AD, namely One Million Years later. At this date starts the One Million Years in the ?uvre of On Kawara, transcribed here for this edition on 2000 pages. The second volume, Future ? For the last one, starts in 1993 AD and ends One Million Years later, in 1001992. This period is equally transcribed for the edition on 2000 pages. The text of each page is laid out in 10 columns, rigorously aligned and subdivided in 5 blocks of 100 years. Each block contains 10 lines and each line contains a decennium. The two volumes of the book correspond, their internal organization is identical.