Joseph Kosuth has not exhibited in France for eight years. Now the conceptual artist has devised an astonishing new installation for the galerie Yvon Lambert at 108, rue vieille du Temple until 21 December. The work is entitled “Modernity: three commas and a note” and refers to the cultural context in Paris at the turn of the century by reference to three foreigners who each evolved there: Walter Benjamin, Piet Mondrian and Gertrude Stein.
Raymond Hains’s modernism is more clearly a product of the automobile industry, particularly for his exhibition which has the evocative title “CITROEN, moi j’aime..” at Daniel Templon, 30 rue Beaubourg until 30 December. The artist, ever searching for a pun, conjugates the logo of the French company in all its forms (photos, neon signs, etc). Evocation of the cars of presidents of the French Republic or geometric motifs abstracted from everyday life? Hains manipulates the enigma and juggles the cards with dexterity. The art of Felice Varini also plays with our points of view. The artist, who currently lives in New York, has conceived an installation for the galerie Sous-Sol, (12 rue du Petit Musc) until 8 February, which alters, forms and reforms with our movements.
Robert Malaval cultivates the informal. The galerie R&L Beaubourg (23, rue du Renard) until 14 December focusses on “White food”, a series of historic works executed between 1961 and 1964. A parasitic secretion made up of papier maché, glued and painted in white, invades all these pieces, tables, sculptures, objects in the image of an inexorable illness. At the same time, Andy Warhol was executing his first silkscreen prints on canvas: “Rauschenberg” (1962), “Jackie” (1964). The galerie Jérôme de Noirmont (38 avenue Matignon) exhibits some of these works until 25 January, as well as “Reversal paintings” of 1979-80, the “Children paintings” of 1983 and a suite of works executed by the artist just before his death in 1987. This exhibition of paintings was mounted in collaboration with Andrea Caratsch and is the first in Paris since the retrospective organised at the George Pompidou Centre in 1991.
Quite the opposite is the art of Gérard Garouste which is immersed in tradition, as much from the technical point of view as the subject matter of his works. A cross-section of canvases executed by the artist during the past three years as well as gouaches on paper realised similarly on printed calico for the Bibliothèque Nationale are exhibited at the galerie Durand-Dessert (28 rue de Lappe) until 31 January, before being displayed at the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Valence (17 March to 11 May 1997). The young photographer Valérie Jouve has hitherto worked in the south, at Marseilles.Her first personal exhibition at the galerie Anne de Villepoix (11, rue des Tournelles) until 15 December draws together a series of portraits of people.
Originally appeared in The Art Newspaper as 'Kosuth conjugates Walter Benjamin Mondrian and Gertrude Stein'