LAURENT MONTARON

Everything we see could be something else

27 febbraio – 10 maggio 2015

Monitor è lieta di annunciare la prima personale in galleria dell’artista francese Laurent Montaron (Verneuil-sur-Avre, vive e lavora a Parigi) già presente in Palazzo Enciclopedico – 55° Biennale di Venezia e prossimamente a You imagine what you desire – 19° Biennale of Sydney. I lavori di Laurent Montaron partono dalla storia della tecnologia per esaminare i sistemi di credenze contemporanei. Attraverso l’investigazione degli strumenti che creano le nostre rappresentazioni, l’artista francese svela i paradossi che accompagnano la conoscenza della modernità.
Spesso utilizzando dispositivi antichi e complessi, i suoi lavori mettono in primo piano la presenza di apparati utilizzati per la loro stessa creazione, attirando l’ attenzione sull’atto della “registrazione” come tentativo di tradurre l’esperienza in informazione. Reggendo l’inestricabile filo che lega i temi esplorati nel suo lavoro e i processi implicati nella loro costruzione, l’artista sottolinea che “nessuna immagine può essere separata dal proprio processo di creazione”.
Monitor presenterà, per la prima volta in Italia, il nuovo film The Nature of the self,realizzato con il supporto dell’Accademia di Francia a Roma – Villa Medici nel 2013, mentre l’artista era pensionnaire presso di essa. Proprio a Villa Medici verrà proiettato in anteprima martedì 25 febbraio alle ore 18h00 Nature of the self, a cui seguirà Short study on the nature of things (2011). (Capienza limitata, ingresso libero fino a esautimento posti). Insieme al film Monitor presenterà due lavori fotografici e il pezzo How can one hide from that which never sets?, 2013, una vetrina con uno specchio tagliato a metà e installato obliquamente. Lo specchio è stato realizzato attraverso un processo chimico calcolato da Justus von Liebig, che nel 1835 ricostruì la mistura del mercurio-stagno normalmente usato, con un sottile strato d’argento depositato sul retro del vetro. Il processo di von Liebig presenta delle somiglianze con i principi chimici usati nella produzione dell’immagine fotografica.
How can one hide from that which never sets? Fornisce infatti una rappresentazione dei principi della visione e si interroga sulla funzione dello sguardo. Il riflesso appare solo quando incrociamo lo specchio ma al posto di un nostra immagine ci viene restituita quella di qualcos’altro. Un neon nella parte posteriore della vetrina, rivela lo spazio retrostante. Nei film e nelle installazioni di Montaron, l’impulso verso razionalità e progresso, rappresentato dagli sviluppi tecnologici, si muove in opposizione a processi misteriosi e macchine irrazionali: piuttosto che per ottenere chiarezza e coerenza, essi possono essere usati anche per nascondere, complicare, oscurare.

Un ringraziamento speciale all’ Accademia di Francia a Roma – Villa Medici per il prezioso supporto.

Laurent Montaron

Laurent Montaron Verneuil-sur-Avre, 1972. Vive e lavora a Parigi.

Solo shows: 2013Prospectif Cinema: Laurent Montaron, Centre Pompidou, Paris; Pigna Project Space, Roma; 2012 galerie schleicher+lange, Berlin; 2010 PACE, Kunsthaus Baselland, Basel; Will there be a sea battle tomorrow ?, Centre Clark, Montreal – Quebec; 2009 IAC – Institut d’art Contemporain, Villeurbanne – Lyon; AYYLU, FRAC Champagne-Ardenne, Reims; 2008 galerie schleicher+lange, Paris; Kunstverein, Freiburg; 2006; LMAKprojects (Chelsea), New York (USA); 2005 La Galerie, Centre d’art contemporain de Noisy-le-Sec.
Group shows (selected): 2014 19th Biennale of Sydney : You Imagine What You Desire, Sydney 2013 LA BIENNALE DI VENEZIA
, 55th International Art Exhibition, Venice; 2012 Open End, Sammlung Goetz Collection, Haus der Kunst, München Lost in LA, Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery, Barnsdall Art Park, Los Angeles curator : Marc-olivier Wahlerm, Oh, you mean cellophane and all that crap, , New York (US) curator : Victoria Brooks; Un nouveau Festival, Centre Pompidou, Paris; 2011 Homo Ludens – Act II Motive Gallery, Amsterdam ; Performa 11-Performa, New York City, NY, Les amis de mes amis sont mes amis, hommage à Ján Mančuška – Galerie Jocelyn Wolff, Paris; 2010 Prospective XXIè siècle » Le Plateau, FRAC Ile de France, Paris, Collection’10 » IAC – Institut d’art Contemporain, Villeurbanne – Lyon; 2009 Ce que j’ai sous les yeux», Musée d’art moderne de la ville de Paris, Paris New Acquisitions; 2008 SOUND OF MUSIC », Collection FRAC Nord-Pas de Calais, Tri Postal, Lille, Translation Video Works from the Public Collections of France – Moscow museum of modern art – MMOMA, Moscow; 2007 I am a future melancholic» (screening), Tate Modern, London; 2006 L’usage du monde», Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Mali Salon, Rijka, Dormir, Rêver…et autres nuits », CAPC, Musée d’art contemporain, Bordeaux.

ENGLISH VERSION

Laurent Montaron

Everything we see could be something else

February 27th – May 1oth 2014

Monitor is glad to announce its first solo show by French artist Laurent Montaron (Verneuil-sur-Avre), who lives and works in Paris.
The work of Laurent Montaron (55th Venice Biennale and 19th Sidney Biennale) is suffused with the contemporary history of the media. Through his exploration of the tools that shape our representations, Montaron lays bare the paradoxes that accompany our awareness of modernity, drawing on the history of technology to examine systems of belief and investigate the ways in which innovations have continually given rise to new ways of observing and understanding our world. By frequently resorting to obscure and outmoded devices, Montaron foregrounds the presence of the apparatuses used to create them, drawing attention to the act of recording as an attempt to render experience into information. In maintaining the inextricable link between the themes he explores in his works and the processes involved in their assemblage, he insists “no image can be dissociated from the way it has been made.”
Monitor will host the Italian premiere of Montaron’s new film Nature of the Self, which he completed during his residency at the French Academy in Rome – Villa Medici – in the autumn of 2013. On February 25th at Villa Medici there will be the premiere of the film Nature of the self, together with the projection of Short study on the nature of things (2011). (Free entry until all available seats are taken).
Together with the film Nature of the self (2014) Monitor will also be presenting two photographic projects and the piece How can one hide from that which never sets? (2013), a display case with a mirror cut in half and installed obliquely. The mirror has been made according to the process devised by chemist Justus von Liebig, who in 1835 replaced the tin and mercury mixture normally used to make mirrors by a fine coat of silver on the rear of the glass. Liebig’s innovation presents some similarities with the principles of chemical revelation of the photographic image. How can one hide from that which never sets? offers a representation of the mechanism of vision and questions the function of gaze. The reflection appears only when we pass in front of the mirror but it is of something else, not our own image, because a neon placed behind the display case reveals the space on the other side.
In Montaron’s films and installations the impulse towards rationality and progress, embodied by technological developments, is countered by the irrational and mysterious workings of machines. Rather than help achieve clarity and coherence, they can be used to veil, complicate and obscure.

Until May 10th

With special thanks to the Académie de France in Rome – Villa Medici – for its valuable support

Laurent Montaron

Laurent Montaron Verneuil-sur-Avre, 1972. he lives and works in Paris.

Solo shows: 2013 Prospectif Cinema: Laurent Montaron, Centre Pompidou, Paris; Pigna Project Space, Roma; 2012 galerie schleicher+lange, Berlin; 2010 PACE, Kunsthaus Baselland, Basel; Will there be a sea battle tomorrow ?, Centre Clark, Montreal – Quebec; 2009 IAC – Institut d’art Contemporain, Villeurbanne – Lyon; AYYLU, FRAC Champagne-Ardenne, Reims; 2008 galerie schleicher+lange, Paris; Kunstverein, Freiburg; 2006; LMAKprojects (Chelsea), New York (USA); 2005 La Galerie, Centre d’art contemporain de Noisy-le-Sec.
Group shows (selected): 2014 19th Biennale of Sydney : You Imagine What You Desire, Sydney 2013 LA BIENNALE DI VENEZIA
, 55th International Art Exhibition, Venice; 2012 Open End, Sammlung Goetz Collection, Haus der Kunst, München Lost in LA, Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery, Barnsdall Art Park, Los Angeles curator : Marc-olivier Wahlerm, Oh, you mean cellophane and all that crap, , New York (US) curator : Victoria Brooks; Un nouveau Festival, Centre Pompidou, Paris; 2011 Homo Ludens – Act II Motive Gallery, Amsterdam ; Performa 11-Performa, New York City, NY, Les amis de mes amis sont mes amis, hommage à Ján Mančuška – Galerie Jocelyn Wolff, Paris; 2010 Prospective XXIè siècle » Le Plateau, FRAC Ile de France, Paris, Collection’10 » IAC – Institut d’art Contemporain, Villeurbanne – Lyon; 2009 Ce que j’ai sous les yeux», Musée d’art moderne de la ville de Paris, Paris New Acquisitions; 2008 SOUND OF MUSIC », Collection FRAC Nord-Pas de Calais, Tri Postal, Lille, Translation Video Works from the Public Collections of France – Moscow museum of modern art – MMOMA, Moscow; 2007 I am a future melancholic» (screening), Tate Modern, London; 2006 L’usage du monde», Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Mali Salon, Rijka, Dormir, Rêver…et autres nuits », CAPC, Musée d’art contemporain, Bordeaux.