Tino Sehgal interrogates the nature of an exhibition in the 21st century in his survey show, Carte blanche à Tino Sehgal, at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris (until 18 December). “A solo show is a monument for individualism, giving all this space to an individual,” says the British-German, Berlin-based artist known for his “constructed situations”.
The exhibition is focused around experiences and interactions between visitors and 300 “participants”, aged between eight and 82, enacting Sehgal's works. It brings together These Associations, first presented in Tate Modern's Turbine Hall in 2012, This Variation (2012), conceived for Documenta 13, This Objective of That Object (2004) and This Progress (2006).
Sehgal has also created a new piece based on Ann Lee (2011), composed of a teenage girl who is a former magna character brought to life. The original piece was inspired by Philippe Parreno and Pierre Huyghe's Annlee character and their project No Ghost Just a Shell (1999-2002). In Sehgal's new piece, a boy called Marcel begins talking to Ann Lee, then dancing and singing with her, before asking her, “Have you ever been outside an exhibition space?” and leading her out of the room. Just as Parreno included Sehgal's Ann Lee in his solo show at the Palais de Tokyo in 2013, Sehgal has returned the compliment and included Parreno's work in his exhibition.
Indeed, the exhibition is a kind of interface between a solo exhibition and an artist-curated group one. Daniel Buren has recreated his site-specific ceiling installation shown in the same place in 2004, while Huyghe has created a new work, Living/Cancer/Variator (2016), presented in the basement, which is flooded with a reactive pool of water. “Any change occurring in this environment modifies the development conditions of an in vitro cancer, which reacts, accelerates, adapts,” according to a statement. Also featured are James Coleman's film Box (1977) and works by Félix González-Torres.
Referring to the interactive nature of Sehgal's work, Jean de Loisy, the president of the Palais de Tokyo, emphasises the notion of faith. “Nothing is possible if you don't enter into trust with the participants and allow the constructed situations that Tino Sehgal imagined to be lived,” he says.
The exhibition has opened days after a ballet that Sehgal choreographed, using dancers from the opera's dance school, ended at the Opéra national de Paris. “What was interesting for me in the opera was to really transform from one format to the other; it started out with an exhibition, then it was a proper theatrical set-up, and then we did this collective but quite liberalised moment in a big grand staircase,” he says.
CORRECTION: This article was corrected on 17 October. We falsely stated that works by Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster are included in the show, they are actually by Félix González-Torres.