Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster. 1887–2058
Brasilia Hall, 1998/2000
Neon lighting, carpet, small monitor (built into the wall)
A vast green carpet recalling grass, a neon sign that reads Brasilia Hall, and at the far end, a monitor placed inside a recess in a wall which screens the the artist’s film Brasilia. The installation evokes the democratic opens space of Brasilia – a modernist city designed between 1957 and 1960 by Lucia Costa and Oscar Niemeyer.
Collection Moderna Museet, Stockholm
Éspace 86 (rosa), 2016 (foreground)
Environment
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Brasilia Hall, 1998/2000 (detail)
Neon lighting, carpet, small monitor (built into the wall)
A vast green carpet recalling grass, a neon sign that reads Brasilia Hall, and at the far end, a monitor placed inside a recess in a wall which screens the the artist’s film Brasilia. The installation evokes the democratic opens space of Brasilia – a modernist city designed between 1957 and 1960 by Lucia Costa and Oscar Niemeyer.
Collection Moderna Museet, Stockholm
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Brasilia Hall, 1998/2000 (detail)
Neon lighting, carpet, small monitor (built into the wall)
A vast green carpet recalling grass, a neon sign that reads Brasilia Hall, and at the far end, a monitor placed inside a recess in a wall which screens the the artist’s film Brasilia. The installation evokes the democratic opens space of Brasilia – a modernist city designed between 1957 and 1960 by Lucia Costa and Oscar Niemeyer.
Collection Moderna Museet, Stockholm
Éspace 86 (rosa), 2016 (detail)
Environment
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Textorama, 2009
Vinyl on wall, panoramic calligram
In collaboration with Marie Proyart
Three large-scale dioramas, inspired by traditional natural history museum displays, depict three terrains ― the tropics, the desert, and the North Atlantic. Traces of man-made interventions are evident in each landscape. In lieu of wildlife, however, the Dioramas take literature as their central subject.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Double Happiness, 1999
Neon
Chinese character for “Happiness”, twice
Gonzalez-Foerster's use of symbols refers both to the difficulty of translating abstract concepts into language and between cultures. This work transcends any direct communication of signs or symbols, rather opening up a space of possibilities, with a rich array of associations, from both within the artist's particular oeuvre, and the outside world.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Double Happiness, 1999
Neon
Chinese character for “Happiness”, twice
Gonzalez-Foerster's use of symbols refers both to the difficulty of translating abstract concepts into language and between cultures. This work transcends any direct communication of signs or symbols, rather opening up a space of possibilities, with a rich array of associations, from both within the artist's particular oeuvre, and the outside world.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Une Chambre En Ville, 1996 (left)
Newspapers, telephone, mini television, radio alarm clock, lighting system emitting light that changes from blue to red and then to orange
This is an early iconic work from the artist‘s series of Chambres (rooms) that, with economic simplicity, construct environments meant to evoke periods (developmental, cultural, historical), atmospheres or emotions through color, functional or ornamental objects, and sometimes imagery. The Chambres act like conflations of mnemonic traces, creating spaces full of a vague concreteness, of half-remembered occurrences and objects, which also characterizes the dynamics of dreams.
Cronotopes & Dioramas (Desertic), 2009 (right)
Mural painting, books, various components
Three large-scale dioramas, inspired by traditional natural history museum displays, depict three terrains ― the tropics, the desert, and the North Atlantic. Traces of man-made interventions are evident in each landscape. In lieu of wildlife, however, the Dioramas take literature as their central subject.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Une Chambre En Ville, 1996
Newspapers, telephone, mini television, radio alarm clock, lighting system emitting light that changes from blue to red and then to orange
This is an early iconic work from the artist‘s series of Chambres (rooms) that, with economic simplicity, construct environments meant to evoke periods (developmental, cultural, historical), atmospheres or emotions through color, functional or ornamental objects, and sometimes imagery. The Chambres act like conflations of mnemonic traces, creating spaces full of a vague concreteness, of half-remembered occurrences and objects, which also characterizes the dynamics of dreams.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Une Chambre En Ville, 1996
Newspapers, telephone, mini television, radio alarm clock, lighting system emitting light that changes from blue to red and then to orange
This is an early iconic work from the artist‘s series of Chambres (rooms) that, with economic simplicity, construct environments meant to evoke periods (developmental, cultural, historical), atmospheres or emotions through color, functional or ornamental objects, and sometimes imagery. The Chambres act like conflations of mnemonic traces, creating spaces full of a vague concreteness, of half-remembered occurrences and objects, which also characterizes the dynamics of dreams.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Une Chambre En Ville, 1996
Newspapers, telephone, mini television, radio alarm clock, lighting system emitting light that changes from blue to red and then to orange
This is an early iconic work from the artist‘s series of Chambres (rooms) that, with economic simplicity, construct environments meant to evoke periods (developmental, cultural, historical), atmospheres or emotions through color, functional or ornamental objects, and sometimes imagery. The Chambres act like conflations of mnemonic traces, creating spaces full of a vague concreteness, of half-remembered occurrences and objects, which also characterizes the dynamics of dreams.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Une Chambre En Ville, 1996
Newspapers, telephone, mini television, radio alarm clock, lighting system emitting light that changes from blue to red and then to orange
This is an early iconic work from the artist‘s series of Chambres (rooms) that, with economic simplicity, construct environments meant to evoke periods (developmental, cultural, historical), atmospheres or emotions through color, functional or ornamental objects, and sometimes imagery. The Chambres act like conflations of mnemonic traces, creating spaces full of a vague concreteness, of half-remembered occurrences and objects, which also characterizes the dynamics of dreams.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Une Chambre En Ville, 1996
Newspapers, telephone, mini television, radio alarm clock, lighting system emitting light that changes from blue to red and then to orange
This is an early iconic work from the artist‘s series of Chambres (rooms) that, with economic simplicity, construct environments meant to evoke periods (developmental, cultural, historical), atmospheres or emotions through color, functional or ornamental objects, and sometimes imagery. The Chambres act like conflations of mnemonic traces, creating spaces full of a vague concreteness, of half-remembered occurrences and objects, which also characterizes the dynamics of dreams.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Une Chambre En Ville, 1996
Newspapers, telephone, mini television, radio alarm clock, lighting system emitting light that changes from blue to red and then to orange
This is an early iconic work from the artist‘s series of Chambres (rooms) that, with economic simplicity, construct environments meant to evoke periods (developmental, cultural, historical), atmospheres or emotions through color, functional or ornamental objects, and sometimes imagery. The Chambres act like conflations of mnemonic traces, creating spaces full of a vague concreteness, of half-remembered occurrences and objects, which also characterizes the dynamics of dreams.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Textorama, 2009 (left)
Vinyl on wall, panoramic calligram
In collaboration with Marie Proyart
Three large-scale dioramas, inspired by traditional natural history museum displays, depict three terrains ― the tropics, the desert, and the North Atlantic. Traces of man-made interventions are evident in each landscape. In lieu of wildlife, however, the Dioramas take literature as their central subject.
Une Chambre En Ville, 1996 (right)
Newspapers, telephone, mini television, radio alarm clock, lighting system emitting light that changes from blue to red and then to orange
This is an early iconic work from the artist‘s series of Chambres (rooms) that, with economic simplicity, construct environments meant to evoke periods (developmental, cultural, historical), atmospheres or emotions through color, functional or ornamental objects, and sometimes imagery. The Chambres act like conflations of mnemonic traces, creating spaces full of a vague concreteness, of half-remembered occurrences and objects, which also characterizes the dynamics of dreams.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Une Chambre En Ville, 1996 (left)
Newspapers, telephone, mini television, radio alarm clock, lighting system emitting light that changes from blue to red and then to orange
This is an early iconic work from the artist‘s series of Chambres (rooms) that, with economic simplicity, construct environments meant to evoke periods (developmental, cultural, historical), atmospheres or emotions through color, functional or ornamental objects, and sometimes imagery. The Chambres act like conflations of mnemonic traces, creating spaces full of a vague concreteness, of half-remembered occurrences and objects, which also characterizes the dynamics of dreams.
Cronotopes & Dioramas (Desertic), 2009 (right)
Mural painting, books, various components
Three large-scale dioramas, inspired by traditional natural history museum displays, depict three terrains ― the tropics, the desert, and the North Atlantic. Traces of man-made interventions are evident in each landscape. In lieu of wildlife, however, the Dioramas take literature as their central subject.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Cronotopes & Dioramas (Desertic), 2009
Mural painting, books, various components
Three large-scale dioramas, inspired by traditional natural history museum displays, depict three terrains ― the tropics, the desert, and the North Atlantic. Traces of man-made interventions are evident in each landscape. In lieu of wildlife, however, the Dioramas take literature as their central subject.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Cronotopes & Dioramas (Desertic), 2009
Mural painting, books, various components
Three large-scale dioramas, inspired by traditional natural history museum displays, depict three terrains ― the tropics, the desert, and the North Atlantic. Traces of man-made interventions are evident in each landscape. In lieu of wildlife, however, the Dioramas take literature as their central subject.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Cronotopes & Dioramas (Desertic), 2009
Mural painting, books, various components
Three large-scale dioramas, inspired by traditional natural history museum displays, depict three terrains ― the tropics, the desert, and the North Atlantic. Traces of man-made interventions are evident in each landscape. In lieu of wildlife, however, the Dioramas take literature as their central subject.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Cronotopes & Dioramas (Desertic), 2009
Mural painting, books, various components
Three large-scale dioramas, inspired by traditional natural history museum displays, depict three terrains ― the tropics, the desert, and the North Atlantic. Traces of man-made interventions are evident in each landscape. In lieu of wildlife, however, the Dioramas take literature as their central subject.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
euqinimod & costumes, 2014
Environment
Cronotopes & Dioramas (Desertic), 2009 (background)
Mural painting, books, various components
Three large-scale dioramas, inspired by traditional natural history museum displays, depict three terrains ― the tropics, the desert, and the North Atlantic. Traces of man-made interventions are evident in each landscape. In lieu of wildlife, however, the Dioramas take literature as their central subject.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
euqinimod & costumes, 2014
Environment
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
euqinimod & costumes, 2014
Environment
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
euqinimod & costumes, 2014
Environment
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Séances Biographiques, 3e session, 1994/2015
Chairs, desk, lamps, photocopier, framed archival digital prints (RGB Prints, 2013), Kodak prints on transparent film mounted under Plexiglas (Chambres, 1996) and various photocopies
Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster drew biographical chronologies based on conversations with visitors. Photocopies of these drawings became part of the installation; visitors took the original drawings home. This is the only chambre by the artist to comprise an interactive possibility.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Séances Biographiques, 3e session, 1994/2015
Chairs, desk, lamps, photocopier, framed archival digital prints (RGB Prints, 2013), Kodak prints on transparent film mounted under Plexiglas (Chambres, 1996) and various photocopies
Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster drew biographical chronologies based on conversations with visitors. Photocopies of these drawings became part of the installation; visitors took the original drawings home. This is the only chambre by the artist to comprise an interactive possibility.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Séances Biographiques, 3e session, 1994/2015
Chairs, desk, lamps, photocopier, framed archival digital prints (RGB Prints, 2013), Kodak prints on transparent film mounted under Plexiglas (Chambres, 1996) and various photocopies
Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster drew biographical chronologies based on conversations with visitors. Photocopies of these drawings became part of the installation; visitors took the original drawings home. This is the only chambre by the artist to comprise an interactive possibility.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Séances Biographiques, 3e session, 1994/2015
Chairs, desk, lamps, photocopier, framed archival digital prints (RGB Prints, 2013), Kodak prints on transparent film mounted under Plexiglas (Chambres, 1996) and various photocopies
Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster drew biographical chronologies based on conversations with visitors. Photocopies of these drawings became part of the installation; visitors took the original drawings home. This is the only chambre by the artist to comprise an interactive possibility.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
R.W.F. (Rainer Werner Fassbinder), 1993
Installation of bed, cushions, chair, carpet, wall paint, and reflective appliqué, photocopied image of Rainer Werner Fassbinder
For a 1993 solo exhibition, Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster transformed an entire apartment in Cologne into an imaginary film set, evoking Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s practice of using his own apartment as a film location. R.W.F. is the only extant work from Gonzalez-Foerster’s exhibition which featured a sequence of rooms, with reference to RWF films such as Lola and Veronica Voss.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
R.W.F. (Rainer Werner Fassbinder), 1993
Installation of bed, cushions, chair, carpet, wall paint, and reflective appliqué, photocopied image of Rainer Werner Fassbinder
For a 1993 solo exhibition, Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster transformed an entire apartment in Cologne into an imaginary film set, evoking Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s practice of using his own apartment as a film location. R.W.F. is the only extant work from Gonzalez-Foerster’s exhibition which featured a sequence of rooms, with reference to RWF films such as Lola and Veronica Voss.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
R.W.F. (Rainer Werner Fassbinder), 1993
Installation of bed, cushions, chair, carpet, wall paint, and reflective appliqué, photocopied image of Rainer Werner Fassbinder
For a 1993 solo exhibition, Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster transformed an entire apartment in Cologne into an imaginary film set, evoking Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s practice of using his own apartment as a film location. R.W.F. is the only extant work from Gonzalez-Foerster’s exhibition which featured a sequence of rooms, with reference to RWF films such as Lola and Veronica Voss.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Exotourisme, 2002/2013
Neon
The project Exotourisme addresses complex transient experiences such as an ambience of a city space, an exotic travel or a momentous passing vision of a dream. Although it can be read as a critique of the practice of touristic exploration, exoticism and restless search for the new impressions, it is still also an invitation to dream up, visualize and contemplate distant unknown landscapes.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Exotourisme, 2002/2013
Neon
The project Exotourisme addresses complex transient experiences such as an ambience of a city space, an exotic travel or a momentous passing vision of a dream. Although it can be read as a critique of the practice of touristic exploration, exoticism and restless search for the new impressions, it is still also an invitation to dream up, visualize and contemplate distant unknown landscapes.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Exotourisme, 2002/2013
Neon
The project Exotourisme addresses complex transient experiences such as an ambience of a city space, an exotic travel or a momentous passing vision of a dream. Although it can be read as a critique of the practice of touristic exploration, exoticism and restless search for the new impressions, it is still also an invitation to dream up, visualize and contemplate distant unknown landscapes.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Exotourisme (with Christophe van Huffel), 2002
Video (colour, sound, 43:00 min)
An animated cosmic landscape results from a layering of computer-generated two and three dimensional imagery over moving images. Combining the aesthetics of a 1960's science fiction film with visual and acoustic intensities of color and sound, the film presents a vision of an enigmatic intergalactic space journey, a fantasy about distant and unreachable territories.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Exotourisme (with Christophe van Huffel), 2002
Video (colour, sound, 43:00 min)
An animated cosmic landscape results from a layering of computer-generated two and three dimensional imagery over moving images. Combining the aesthetics of a 1960's science fiction film with visual and acoustic intensities of color and sound, the film presents a vision of an enigmatic intergalactic space journey, a fantasy about distant and unreachable territories.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Exotourisme (with Christophe van Huffel), 2002
Video (colour, sound, 43:00 min)
An animated cosmic landscape results from a layering of computer-generated two and three dimensional imagery over moving images. Combining the aesthetics of a 1960's science fiction film with visual and acoustic intensities of color and sound, the film presents a vision of an enigmatic intergalactic space journey, a fantasy about distant and unreachable territories.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Otello 1887, 2015
The work takes as point of departure Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Otello which in turn takes its plot from William Shakespeare’s 1603/4 tragedy by the same name. The film can be seen in reference to the artist's larger project M.2062, which is, in her words, a prospective and fragmented opera that incorporates “not only literature, movies and music but also quotations, adaptations, juxtapositions, games, and identities."
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Otello 1887, 2015
The work takes as point of departure Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Otello which in turn takes its plot from William Shakespeare’s 1603/4 tragedy by the same name. The film can be seen in reference to the artist's larger project M.2062, which is, in her words, a prospective and fragmented opera that incorporates “not only literature, movies and music but also quotations, adaptations, juxtapositions, games, and identities."
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Lola Montez in Berlin, 2015
Video
Duration 03:58 min
For this work, Gonzalez-Foerster draws on the 1955 film Lola Montez, in which its director Max Ophüls envisioned the life of a minor historical character mostly known for her amorous exploits with famous men. The film represents her as a woman caught in the exploitative machinery of a sensationalist public and poignantly visualizes this exploitation through the figure’s display as scandalous beast in a circus.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Véra & Mister Hyde, 2015
HD video, format 16:9
Duration 17:00 min
The film continuously intercuts footage from two of Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster’s apparitions, Véra Nabokov and Bob Dylan, from a series entitled M.2062 (la partie de l’opéra). The constant shift from color to black and white, and from spoken word to signage may constitute an analogy to Vladimir Nabokov's theory of good and evil.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
MM, 2015
Slide show
A series of eight photographs of an apparition of the artist as Marylin Monroe. These photographs appear between each of the films shown in the cinema.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Belle comme le jour, 2012
Video
Duration 13:00 min
A homage and imagined prequel to Luis Bunuel’s Belle de Jour (1967) and Manoel Olivieira’s Belle toujours (2006). Belle Comme le Jour is a possible illustration of an ongoing dialogue between Bunuel and Hitchcock, in an open conversation with film directors Truffaut and De Palma. Explores the first fictional encounter of a legendary screen and real-life couple: Catherine Deneuve and Marcello Mastroianni, the ultimate embodiment of cinematic passion.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
De Novo, 2009
Film (black and white, color, stereo sound, French with English subtitles, 4:3 format)
Duration 20:00 min
Made in response to her fifth invitation to participate in the Venice Biennale (1990, 1993, 1999, 2003, and 2009), the artist films herself returning the the sites of her previous experiences in Venice, while relating her own fears and anxieties about being an artist.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Noreturn, 2009
HD film (color, sound, 16:9 format)
Duration 16:00 min
Filmed in Gonzalez-Foerster’s 2008 exhibition at Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall in London. A group of children in school uniform enter an exhibition space in which bunk beds are placed in orderly grids among giant sculptures. First
excited, playing and fooling around, eventually the children shelter underneath a Henry Moore sculpture. The atmosphere changes gradually as the children sit on the bunk beds reading and dozing off.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Atomic Park (Film Version), 2003/2004
Super 8 and 35 mm film (black and white, color, stereo sound, 4:3 format)
Duration 8:14 min
Filmed in the White Sands desert, located near Trinity Site (in New Mexico), where the very first atomic bomb was tested in July 1945. The voice of Marilyn Monroe, from John Huston's film The Misfits, can be heard in the distance.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Ann Lee in Anzen Zone, 2000
DVD projected via video beamer, loudspeaker, light
Duration 3:25 min
An animated Manga figure, Ann Lee, describing her fate as a cheap commercial item. She makes a ghostlike appearance, and she speaks Japanese. She is accompanied by a lookalike, a “living translation” of herself, who presents herself as herald of an apocalyptic prophecy.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
M.2062 (Fitzcarraldo), 2014
HD video, special projection, hologram, pepper ghost effect, computer, amplifier, speakers, special foil screen, lights, curtains
Duration 15:00 min approx.
While previous apparitions by Gonzalez-Foerster were live, single occurrences, this work for the first time captures the time-based quality of those performative events. Technically sophisticated (both the recording and the projection), the ghostly flickering images in effect make visible the fragility and fleetingness of Gonzalez-Foerster’s apparitions. The holographic projection shows Gonzalez-Foerster as Fitzcarraldo, the protagonist of Werner Herzog’s eponymous 1981 film, portrayed by Klaus Kinski.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
After, 2009
Neon, wallpaper
This work was part of the performances K.62 and K.85 by Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster and Ari Benjamin Meyers, staged at the Abrons Art Center in New York, at the Hebbel am Ufer Theater in Berlin and at Kaaitheater, Brussels. It plays on the idea of an “after party.” It also references the Martin Scorsese film After Hours (1985). The performance staged by Gonzalez-Foerster and Benjamin Meyers also took the events of this film as a reference point, leading the viewers on a surreal obstacle course through Soho, before gathering the group under Gonzalez-Foerster’s neon sign.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
After, 2009 (left)
Neon, wallpaper
This work was part of the performances K.62 and K.85 by Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster and Ari Benjamin Meyers, staged at the Abrons Art Center in New York, at the Hebbel am Ufer Theater in Berlin and at Kaaitheater, Brussels. It plays on the idea of an “after party.” It also references the Martin Scorsese film After Hours (1985). The performance staged by Gonzalez-Foerster and Benjamin Meyers also took the events of this film as a reference point, leading the viewers on a surreal obstacle course through Soho, before gathering the group under Gonzalez-Foerster’s neon sign.
Untitled, 1986/2015 (right)
Column and surface with carpet
The work is from a series included in the artist’s 2015 exhibition at the Museu de Arte Moderna in Rio de Janeiro for which Dominique Gonzalez Foerster recreated works from her early years. On the one hand, the combination of ready-made objects is indebted to the artistic discourse from the time of its first execution when items from daily life were introduced into an art context to question the nature of an artwork. On the other hand, the work evokes formal issues associated with modernist and post-modernist discussions.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Éspace 86 (evm), 2016
Environment
Untitled, 1986/2015 (left)
Column and surface with carpet
The work is from a series included in the artist’s 2015 exhibition at the Museu de Arte Moderna in Rio de Janeiro for which Dominique Gonzalez Foerster recreated works from her early years. On the one hand, the combination of ready-made objects is indebted to the artistic discourse from the time of its first execution when items from daily life were introduced into an art context to question the nature of an artwork. On the other hand, the work evokes formal issues associated with modernist and post-modernist discussions.
Bibliothèque, 1985 (right)
Wood, books, bricks
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Éspace 86 (evm), 2016 (detail)
Environment
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Éspace 86 (evm), 2016
Environment
Untitled, 1986/2015 (left)
Column and surface with carpet
The work is from a series included in the artist’s 2015 exhibition at the Museu de Arte Moderna in Rio de Janeiro for which Dominique Gonzalez Foerster recreated works from her early years. On the one hand, the combination of ready-made objects is indebted to the artistic discourse from the time of its first execution when items from daily life were introduced into an art context to question the nature of an artwork. On the other hand, the work evokes formal issues associated with modernist and post-modernist discussions.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Untitled, 1986/2015
Column and surface with carpet
The work is from a series included in the artist’s 2015 exhibition at the Museu de Arte Moderna in Rio de Janeiro for which Dominique Gonzalez Foerster recreated works from her early years. On the one hand, the combination of ready-made objects is indebted to the artistic discourse from the time of its first execution when items from daily life were introduced into an art context to question the nature of an artwork. On the other hand, the work evokes formal issues associated with modernist and post-modernist discussions.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
K.2066, 2008–16 (detail)
40 metal bunk beds, 100 science fiction books, music (by the composers Arto Lindsay and Kassin), enlarged reproductions of 6 sculptures (by Henry Moore, Alexander Calder, Claes Oldenburg, Katharina Fritsch, Joel Shapiro, Johannes Brus), LED screen showing The Last Film (color, no sound, 30', production: Camera Lucida Productions/Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster), curtain made of PVC-strips (Greenred, 2012–16)
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
K.2066, 2008–16
40 metal bunk beds, 100 science fiction books, music (by the composers Arto Lindsay and Kassin), enlarged reproductions of 6 sculptures (by Henry Moore, Alexander Calder, Claes Oldenburg, Katharina Fritsch, Joel Shapiro, Johannes Brus), LED screen showing The Last Film (color, no sound, 30', production: Camera Lucida Productions/Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster), curtain made of PVC-strips (Greenred, 2012–16)
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
K.2066, 2008–16
40 metal bunk beds, 100 science fiction books, music (by the composers Arto Lindsay and Kassin), enlarged reproductions of 6 sculptures (by Henry Moore, Alexander Calder, Claes Oldenburg, Katharina Fritsch, Joel Shapiro, Johannes Brus), LED screen showing The Last Film (color, no sound, 30', production: Camera Lucida Productions/Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster), curtain made of PVC-strips (Greenred, 2012–16)
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
K.2066, 2008–16
40 metal bunk beds, 100 science fiction books, music (by the composers Arto Lindsay and Kassin), enlarged reproductions of 6 sculptures (by Henry Moore, Alexander Calder, Claes Oldenburg, Katharina Fritsch, Joel Shapiro, Johannes Brus), LED screen showing The Last Film (color, no sound, 30', production: Camera Lucida Productions/Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster), curtain made of PVC-strips (Greenred, 2012–16)
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
K.2066, 2008–16
40 metal bunk beds, 100 science fiction books, music (by the composers Arto Lindsay and Kassin), enlarged reproductions of 6 sculptures (by Henry Moore, Alexander Calder, Claes Oldenburg, Katharina Fritsch, Joel Shapiro, Johannes Brus), LED screen showing The Last Film (color, no sound, 30', production: Camera Lucida Productions/Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster), curtain made of PVC-strips (Greenred, 2012–16)
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
K.2066, 2008–16 (detail)
40 metal bunk beds, 100 science fiction books, music (by the composers Arto Lindsay and Kassin), enlarged reproductions of 6 sculptures (by Henry Moore, Alexander Calder, Claes Oldenburg, Katharina Fritsch, Joel Shapiro, Johannes Brus), LED screen showing The Last Film (color, no sound, 30', production: Camera Lucida Productions/Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster), curtain made of PVC-strips (Greenred, 2012–16)
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
K.2066, 2008–16
40 metal bunk beds, 100 science fiction books, music (by the composers Arto Lindsay and Kassin), enlarged reproductions of 6 sculptures (by Henry Moore, Alexander Calder, Claes Oldenburg, Katharina Fritsch, Joel Shapiro, Johannes Brus), LED screen showing The Last Film (color, no sound, 30', production: Camera Lucida Productions/Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster), curtain made of PVC-strips (Greenred, 2012–16)
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
K.2066, 2008–16
40 metal bunk beds, 100 science fiction books, music (by the composers Arto Lindsay and Kassin), enlarged reproductions of 6 sculptures (by Henry Moore, Alexander Calder, Claes Oldenburg, Katharina Fritsch, Joel Shapiro, Johannes Brus), LED screen showing The Last Film (color, no sound, 30', production: Camera Lucida Productions/Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster), curtain made of PVC-strips (Greenred, 2012–16)
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Splendide Hotel, 2015 (background)
Neon sign, installation
The term Splendide Hotel was adapted from a line by poet Arthur Rimbaud. Gonzalez-Foerster created a complex, intuitive web of literary, cultural, musical, and historical associations around books, objects, discoveries and their authors and readers, around the year 1887.
K.2066, 2008–16 (detail)
40 metal bunk beds, 100 science fiction books, music (by the composers Arto Lindsay and Kassin), enlarged reproductions of 6 sculptures (by Henry Moore, Alexander Calder, Claes Oldenburg, Katharina Fritsch, Joel Shapiro, Johannes Brus), LED screen showing The Last Film (color, no sound, 30', production: Camera Lucida Productions/Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster), curtain made of PVC-strips (Greenred, 2012–16)
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Splendide Hotel, 2015 (background)
Neon sign, installation
The term Splendide Hotel was adapted from a line by poet Arthur Rimbaud. Gonzalez-Foerster created a complex, intuitive web of literary, cultural, musical, and historical associations around books, objects, discoveries and their authors and readers, around the year 1887.
K.2066, 2008–16 (detail)
40 metal bunk beds, 100 science fiction books, music (by the composers Arto Lindsay and Kassin), enlarged reproductions of 6 sculptures (by Henry Moore, Alexander Calder, Claes Oldenburg, Katharina Fritsch, Joel Shapiro, Johannes Brus), LED screen showing The Last Film (color, no sound, 30', production: Camera Lucida Productions/Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster), curtain made of PVC-strips (Greenred, 2012–16)
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Splendide Hotel, 2015
Neon sign, installation
The term Splendide Hotel was adapted from a line by poet Arthur Rimbaud. Gonzalez-Foerster created a complex, intuitive web of literary, cultural, musical, and historical associations around books, objects, discoveries and their authors and readers, around the year 1887.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Splendide Hotel, 2015
Neon sign, installation
The term Splendide Hotel was adapted from a line by poet Arthur Rimbaud. Gonzalez-Foerster created a complex, intuitive web of literary, cultural, musical, and historical associations around books, objects, discoveries and their authors and readers, around the year 1887.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Splendide Hotel, 2015
Neon sign, installation
The term Splendide Hotel was adapted from a line by poet Arthur Rimbaud. Gonzalez-Foerster created a complex, intuitive web of literary, cultural, musical, and historical associations around books, objects, discoveries and their authors and readers, around the year 1887.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Splendide Hotel, 2015
Neon sign, installation
The term Splendide Hotel was adapted from a line by poet Arthur Rimbaud. Gonzalez-Foerster created a complex, intuitive web of literary, cultural, musical, and historical associations around books, objects, discoveries and their authors and readers, around the year 1887.
Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster. 1887–2058
In the art of Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster (born in 1965 in Strasbourg, lives in Paris and Rio de Janeiro), everything revolves around experiences of and reflections on spaces and times. Using often minimal resources, she evokes places, people, and things that exist in one form or another in our collective memory. Her themes may be as diverse as the influence of hippiedom during the 1970s, the film director Rainer Werner Fassbinder, the urban utopia of Brasilia, King Ludwig II, psychoanalysis, a tropical rainstorm, or the prospects for the year 2066.
Using just a few elements, she constructs spaces, uses specially created sounds, produces films, or appears herself as a historical figure. A recurring point of reference in all of these activities is literature. It is not a question of creating the perfect illusion of a certain moment in time or a certain individual, but instead of a state of suspension between recognition and astonishment, memory and speculation. The exhibition title names two specific works, at the same time suggesting that for Gonzalez-Foerster, time is a flowing continuum.
The exhibition in the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen is organized jointly with the Centre George Pompidou in Paris. With approximately 15 labyrinthine spaces occupying two exhibition halls of the K20, it is the largest exhibition devoted to this artist to date, and offers a retrospective overview of her work of the past 25 years.
This exhibition of works by Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster calls attention to a creative personality who has been neglected in Germany to date, who together with other French artists such as Pierre Huyghe and Phillipe Parreno, but also international gures such as Douglas Gordon, Liam Gillick, and Rikrit Tiravanija, has shaped contemporary art globally in decisive ways since the 1990s.