A few days ago I got back from my
holiday to France. It was a very enjoyable time, that was mostly spent reading
books and laying in the sun.
I read a number of books, but spent
most of my time reading Infinite Jest. It was a very complicated read, but once
I'd read around 300 pages I began to understand what was going on. The ideas
surrounding addiction were really interesting, as well as the underlying insinuation
that AA is a monotonous cult. The dystopian world that David Foster Wallace created
was also intriguing, painting a picture of a culture obsessed with advertising,
so much so that in the book each year is subsidized by a corporate sponsor for
tax revenue. For example "Year of the Whopper" and "Year of the
Trial-Size Dove Bar". I would highly recommend this book to anyone.
I also read The Martian, which involved
a man being stuck on Mars and having to fend for himself. It was fun and light.
Towards the end of the holiday I read a book by Dave Eggers' called Your
Fathers, Where Are They? And The Prophets, Do They Live Forever? This was a
short but disturbing read about a young man who, as the book progresses, keeps
kidnapping different people, who are all connected to his mysterious past. Last
year I read another of Eggers' books called The Circle, which introduced you to
a world in the not too distant future that's dominated by social media. This
was an incredibly thought provoking read that makes you want to turn off all of
your electronic devices and go and live up a mountain.
During my holiday I also went to Paris
for a few days, and went to a few galleries there. I first went to the Palais de
Tokyo, which is a consistently interesting experience as the artists are always
allowed to do whatever they want to the space. An example of this would be
Celeste Boursier-Mougenot's installation Acquaalta. In this exhibition he
literally flooded a whole room with water and invites you to board a boat to
explore the landscape, whilst experiencing vivid music and moving images on the
walls around you. This was a truly surreal moment.
Patrick Neu was another artist who was exhibiting
who works with obscure materials in non-traditional ways. A lot of the work was
incredibly detailed and impressive, like a shirt made from bees wings and
lampblack on glass. Although I did enjoy the actual work, I really liked how it
was all displayed. The plinths were made up of stacks of white panels. This was
a good example of how ones work is improved upon when it's displayed well.
The next artist was Korakrit
Arunanondchai, who had made a crazy installation that involved football mannequins
and paint splattered walls. He'd also made a film utilising a drone that
explained what was going on in the main room, which featured a music video with
the only lyrics being "Bangkok City" repeated over and over again. It
was very enjoyable.
My favourite artist at the Palais de
Tokyo was probably Tianzhuo Chen. He put together a completely crazy show which
involved twin tattooed midget rappers, intricate glass bongs displayed in size
order and huge religious symbols painted on the walls. Alongside all of this
was a film of a performance that had occurred at the beginning of the exhibition,
which was mind blowing in itself. Chen was effectively creating a new religion
based on drugs, LGBT hip hop, the London rave scene and a number of other ingredients.
The last major exhibition that I saw
there was put on by Jesper Just, which featured a range of films that featured
two characters; a young girl and a disabled child. The work's central idea for
me was all about being trapped, and this was reinforced by the fact that all
the different videos were in different parts of a huge space, and you were only
able to travel to see them by walking across long gantries suspended by complex
scaffolding structures. I really liked these set of films and how they were all
interconnected.
There were a couple of other artists
who had work displayed including Shelly Nadashi and Basma Alsharif, but the
work wasn't that interesting compared to the other pieces that were being
displayed. This was a shame.
The other gallery that I went to was
the Pompidou Centre, it's a great building with an amazing permanent
exhibition. I first went to see the Mona Hatoum exhibition which was full of
some really interesting work combining unique aesthetics with intriguing
concepts. One of my favourite pieces was "Present Tense" which was
made up of over 2000 blocks of traditional olive oil soap, with a great meaning
that worked well with the overall look of the work. Another sculpture that I
loved was called "Socle du Monde". This was basically a huge block
covered in iron filings that looked like a massive cube of hair when you observed
it from across the room. It was an awesome exhibition that made me think about
my own work, reflecting on how I strive to combine aesthetics with meaning.
Another temporary exhibition at the
Pompidou was devoted to Gottfried Honegger. The paintings on display were all
relatively abstract and shape based, which I'm always a fan of.
Valérie Belin was another artist who
had a solo exhibition there. It featured a range of photographs of mannequins made
to look like humans, bringing to mind ideas surrounding the uncanny valley and questioning
what makes a human a human.
After this I had a quick look around
the permanent exhibitions, but I'd already seen them recently in February when
I went there to look at Jeff Koons show, so I didn't fully immerse myself in the
work this time around.
Now that I'm back I only have less than
a month before I go to the Venice Biennale, before immediately going to uni after
that. So I only have about 20 or so days to completely finish my project, which
I'll hopefully be able to do if I use the time wisely and crack on, which I
hope to do in the next few days.
Daily/Many Snapchat(s):
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