(Melle, France)
Featuring works by over 20 artists artists, the eighth Biennale Internationale d’Art Contemporain de Melle, titled “Le Grand Monnayage”, is on view at seven venues in the region, among Romanesque churches (one of which was a prison), a former tribunal that inspired Jean de La Fontaine, and silver mines, forgotten for several centuries. It is thus opposing the “white cubes” typical of contemporary art that the Biennale hopes to at once rescue the heritage of the city (the largest in all Western Europe from Charles Magnes’ time until the 10th century) and to tell stories, encouraging both artists and visitors to share experiences.
It is imbued with such a spirit that Renata Lucas presents her installation “Heure du Brésil”. The work borrows its title from a famous radio program broadcast by the government every day, and consists on the synchronization of the time when the public lights are turned on and off at Melle with that of the Brazilian capital, Brasília. Placing two distant regions of the globe in the same temporal ruler (France is currently five hours ahead of Brazil, which means its lights only now go down at 9:30 am, three hours after the actual sunrise, at 6:30 am), the artist hopes to make the city inhabitants to get a glimpse on the “insomnia” of Brazilian people, currently caught amidst one of the most intense political crises it has ever faced.
“Biennale Internationale d’Art Contemporain de Melle: Le Grand Monnayage”, group show featuring Ghada Amer, Jannis Kounellis, Aram Bartholl, Cécile Beau & Emma Loriaut, Xinyi Liu, Jean-François Krebs, Clemens Botho Goldbach, Renata Lucas, Pierre Mercier, Gugliemo Castelli, Brognon Rollin, Otobong Nkanga, Ali Cherri, Yoko Ono, Pauline Curnier Jardin, Christodoulos Panayiotou, Hubert Duprat, Pieter Vermeesch, Jimie Durham, Elsa Fauconnet, Philip Wiegard, Kimsooja and Gloria Zein
On view from June 30th through September 23rd, 2018
Various venues (see here for further information)