Pierre Huyghe: Live - Show As Exhibitiion

Hafnarhús

Pierre Huyghe was born in Paris in 1962. He studied visual art at the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs, from which he graduated in 1985. Huyghe’s work has been exhibited in many of the world’s leading museums, including the Tate Modern in London (2006), the Moderna in Stockholm (2005), and the Guggenheim and The Dia Center for the Arts in New York (2003).

Huyghe represented France at the Venice Biennale in 2001. He lives and works in Paris.

In the latter part of the twentieth century French artists were not numerous in the world of international contemporary art, but toward the millennium they drew increasing attention, gaining eminence through participation in large international exhibitions. Nowadays French artists are conspicuous in prestigious international galleries such as The Marian Goodman Gallery, whose stable includes Christian Boltanski, Annette Messager and Pierre Huyghe. Other notable French artists who have come to prominence in recent years include Pierre & Gilles, Jean-Michel Othoniel, Jean-Mac Bustamante, the M/M design team, and Paris-based artists such as Thomas Hirschhorn.

Since 1990, Pierre Huyghe has attracted notice for diverse multimedia works in both conventional exhibition spaces and other public places. In addition to broad-ranging installations, he has exhibited sculpture, posters, photographs, films, and works inviting public participation.

His artwork crystallizes his interest in poetic qualities that can be discovered in all circumstances, creating tension between reality and imagination or reality and fabrication.

Exhibitions of Huyghe’s work are distinguished by his efforts to develop the form of the visual arts exhibition, to shape the norm and approach to art in conventional exhibition spaces. Order and stability characterize conventional art shows, but contemporary art, including Huyghe’s work, is characterized by mobility and instability. Time, motion, and location influence how the artworks come across and affect the experience of visitors to the exhibition.

The title of this exhibition at The Reykjavik Art Museum, LIVE – SHOW AS EXHIBITION, suggests how visitors may experience the works in a direct and unmediated way, like a performance of live music. The title also invites comparison between the experience of a staged production and the quiet experience characteristic of traditional art exhibitions.

The exhibit comprises three major installations, in three museum galleries, in which works from the Reykjavik Art Museum’s collection are displayed and activated by specially brought-in devices operarting on a protocol. The technology and the timing turn an otherwise stationary visual art exhibit into a produced or staged event with public participation..