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Michael Dean
« Tendre-sur-Estime »

Michael Dean
« Tendre-sur-Estime »

Exposition et vente exceptionnelle des éditions de l'artiste
du 14 au 24 octobre 2022

Voir les éditions disponible par ici. 

Une exposition en cinq chapitres de l’artiste britannique Michael Dean initiée par la commissaire d’exposition Julie Boukobza qui débutera le 17 octobre 2022 au jardin des Tuileries (dans le cadre de Sites de Paris + par Art Basel avec la galerie Mendes Wood DM), dans l’espace d’art indépendant Goswell Road, à l’Eglise Saint-Eustache en collaboration avec le festival Move au Centre Pompidou, à la librairie Yvon Lambert et enfin dans le jardin privé de la commissaire.

Biography (en)
Borrowing instruments and strategies from the practices of the sculptor, the writer and the typographer, British artist Michael Dean investigates the relationship between text and physicality. Exploring the three-dimensional possibilities of language, Dean often ‘spells out’ his words through an alphabet of human-scale shapes, employing industrial and everyday materials such as concrete, steel, MDF, padlocks and dyed books of his writings.

While the transmutation of language is particularly important to Dean’s practice, his sculptures are not intended to be read as words, but rather to be identified as an element of language in their own form and imagined as a word or idea. He attributes a physical form to a personally developed language, based on a series of typographic alphabets, which he designs himself.

Addressing the timeless subject of human intimacy, references to the human body are recurrent throughout Dean’s works. Casts of his and his children's fists, limbs and fingers with drilled out eye holes and tongue muscles appear among the forms. The latter of these is particularly emblematic of Dean’s overlapping interest in touch and language, since it is the part of the body which can feel, as well as taste, and which also molds words before they leave our mouths.

His most recent solo exhibitions include Having you on, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead (2018); Analogue LOL, ShanghArt Gallery, Shanghai (2018); Four Fucksakes, Herald St | Museum St, London (2017); Teaxths and Angeruage, Portikus, Frankfurt (2017); Sightings: Michael Dean or Lost True Leaves, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas (2016) and Qualities of Violence, De Appel, Amsterdam (2015).

Additionally, his work has been included in institutional group exhibitions such as The Hepworth Prize for Sculpture 2018, The Hepworth Wakefield, Wakefield (2018); Against The Wall?, S.M.A.K., Ghent (2018); Skulptur Projekte Münster 2017, Münster (2017); Turner Prize, Tate Britain, London (2016); Sculptures Also Die, Centre for Contemporary Culture Strozzina, Florence, (2015); Mirror City, Hayward Gallery London, London (2014) and A History of Inspiration, Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2013).

Commissaire d’exposition
Julie Boukobza

Commissaire d’exposition indépendante basée à Paris, responsable du programme de résidence de la Fondation Luma à Arles.

Tendre-sur-Estime désigne une ville imaginée au XVIIème siècle par la romancière française Madeleine de Scudéry dans son roman Clélie, histoire romaine. Cette ville, avec Tendre-sur-Reconnaissance et Tendre-sur-Inclination, fait partie de Tendre, un pays imaginaire qui inspira la célèbre carte du Tendre et par là même les différentes étapes de la vie amoureuse.  

Quelle différence il y a entre marcher et trébucher ? Se promener et dériver ? Se perdre et se retrouver ?

Si on devait créer une carte de Paris la nuit, les yeux bandés, qui trouverait-on ? Pourquoi tout change quand on se balade main dans la main voire tout seul ? Quelle expérience de Paris conserve-t-on ainsi, quel souvenir nous reste- t-il ? Ce souvenir est-il plus frappant que l’on soit sobre ou non ?

Et qu’advient-il si on visite cette même ville la journée, les yeux grands ouverts, avec une attente exagérée et des moyens très limités, une ville comme Paris dont l’immuable beauté pourrait finir par nous écœurer à tout jamais.

 Et si un Anglais de passage, un artiste nommé Michael Dean, vous prend par la main avant de vous perdre, en vous proposant une nouvelle manière de percevoir une ville que vous pensiez si bien et si mal connaître ? Par le prisme de ses sculptures inclinées, intoxiquées par elles-mêmes, qui défient la gravité, on trébuche sur cette ville entre deux moments de clarté.  Entre deux monuments qui reconfirmeraient presque notre propre existence, alors même que l’on se sent pourtant si confus. Richard Pryor a dit : « que son plus grand pouvoir résidait dans un lampadaire », car c’était la seule chose à laquelle il pouvait se raccrocher quand il tombait dans l’excès. 

L’excès serait donc ce qui caractérise le mieux ce projet qui se déploie dans cinq lieux différents de la capitale à travers les œuvres de Michael Dean :

Un jardin public et privé, une espace d’art indépendant, une librairie et une église. Une constellation de lieux institutionnels ou intimes, intérieurs ou extérieurs, qui tous disent quelque chose d’une œuvre et de sa pratique. Un portrait de l’artiste en mots et en lieux, essayant de saisir l’essence même de ce travail qui oscille entre l’écriture et la sculpture, la typographie et la performance. La plupart de ces sculptures sont montrées à l’extérieur car elles sont conçues initialement dans le jardin qui jouxte l’atelier de l’artiste. C’est la première manifestation de cette envergure en France de Michael Dean, après avoir exposé dans les plus grandes institutions internationales ces dix dernières années.

Mais c’est avant tout un parcours sentimental à travers les rues de Paris, qui commence par une exposition à Goswell Road, un espace d’art indépendant et une maison d’édition fondée par l’ami de jeunesse de l’artiste Anthony Stephinson et son épouse Coralie Ruiz. Deux étudiants qui firent leur première exposition ensemble dans la boutique de fleurs du père d’Anthony. Ce projet raconte des destinées parallèles- les deux hommes se sont perdus de vue pendant vingt ans- le magasin de fleurs de Newcastle devenu cet espace d’art à Paris dans le dixième arrondissement. Ils y évoquent en filigrane leurs origines communes, et les années au milieu qui leurs ont permis de développer leur pratique. La pierre angulaire de cette collaboration étant « Smittens for Smoticons » le nouveau livre de Michael Dean publié pour l’occasion par Goswell Road. Un chemin qui se termine dans le jardin privé de la commissaire d’exposition dans le dix-neuvième arrondissement, où l’on peut contempler, sur rendez-vous uniquement, où même de la rue, une sculpture accrochée fermement à un arbre, une demi-lune qui sourit de la taille d’un enfant de sept ans.

Entre ces deux points géographiques, il y a une intervention dans la librairie Yvon Lambert dans le Marais, où l’artiste présentera tous les livres qu’il a réalisé lui-même depuis ces débuts, dont certains introuvables, et une édition spécialement conçue pour ce projet. Une lecture ardente de Michael Dean avec son fils de son dernier livre « Love Dancing on Hate’s Grave » aura lieu le samedi 22 octobre à l’Eglise Saint-Eustache organisée en partenariat avec le festival Move du Centre Pompidou. Et enfin et surtout des sculptures installées dans le jardin des Tuileries, inspirées des muselets des bouteilles de champagne, formeront le trait d’union formel entre toutes ses parties. Le fantasme ultime de cet exercice serait de créer une cartographie totalement nouvelle, d’un Tendre intime et romanesque, mené par l’artiste et ses fans. Let’s get lost !


Exhibition and sales of the artist's rare books and editions
On view from October 14 to 23, 2022

See the available works online here.

An exhibition in five chapters of the British artist Michael Dean initiated by the curator Julie Boukobza that will start on October 17th 2022 in the Tuileries Garden ( part of Sites of Paris + part Art Basel with Mendes Wood DM gallery ), in the artist-run-space Goswell Road, at Eglise Saint-Eustache in collaboration with Move Festival at Centre Pompidou, at Librairie Yvon Lambert, and the last stop in the curator’s private garden.

Biography
Borrowing instruments and strategies from the practices of the sculptor, the writer and the typographer, British artist Michael Dean investigates the relationship between text and physicality. Exploring the three-dimensional possibilities of language, Dean often ‘spells out’ his words through an alphabet of human-scale shapes, employing industrial and everyday materials such as concrete, steel, MDF, padlocks and dyed books of his writings.

While the transmutation of language is particularly important to Dean’s practice, his sculptures are not intended to be read as words, but rather to be identified as an element of language in their own form and imagined as a word or idea. He attributes a physical form to a personally developed language, based on a series of typographic alphabets, which he designs himself.

Addressing the timeless subject of human intimacy, references to the human body are recurrent throughout Dean’s works. Casts of his and his children's fists, limbs and fingers with drilled out eye holes and tongue muscles appear among the forms. The latter of these is particularly emblematic of Dean’s overlapping interest in touch and language, since it is the part of the body which can feel, as well as taste, and which also molds words before they leave our mouths.

His most recent solo exhibitions include Having you on, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead (2018); Analogue LOL, ShanghArt Gallery, Shanghai (2018); Four Fucksakes, Herald St | Museum St, London (2017); Teaxths and Angeruage, Portikus, Frankfurt (2017); Sightings: Michael Dean or Lost True Leaves, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas (2016) and Qualities of Violence, De Appel, Amsterdam (2015).

Additionally, his work has been included in institutional group exhibitions such as The Hepworth Prize for Sculpture 2018, The Hepworth Wakefield, Wakefield (2018); Against The Wall?, S.M.A.K., Ghent (2018); Skulptur Projekte Münster 2017, Münster (2017); Turner Prize, Tate Britain, London (2016); Sculptures Also Die, Centre for Contemporary Culture Strozzina, Florence, (2015); Mirror City, Hayward Gallery London, London (2014) and A History of Inspiration, Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2013).  

Notes of the curator: Julie Boukobza

Independent curator based in Paris, Head of Luma Arles Residency Program.

Tendre-sur-Estime is a fictional city imagined in the seventeenth century by the French novelist Madeleine de Scudéry in her novel Clélie, a Roman history. This town, together with Tendre-sur-Reconnaissance and Tendre-sur-Inclination, is part of Tendre, an imaginary country which inspired the infamous Carte du Tendre and all the different steps in the sentimental life.

What is the difference between stumbling and walking? Strolling and deriving? Getting lost and finding your way?

If one had to do a Paris’map blind folded at night, what would one find? What is the difference if you walk hand in hand or if you wander alone? Which experience of Paris will you get and which memory will you keep? Will the memories become more vivid were you sober or not?

So what happens if you visit that same city during the day, eyes too wide to be shut, high expectations and low means, a city like Paris of enduring beauty that makes you ever nauseous.

What if a British man, an artist named Michael Dean holds your hand and gets you lost, gives you a new vision of a city you thought you knew (nothing about)? Through his twisted and intoxicated sculptures that defies gravity you stumble upon a town having moments of clarity and finding landmarks to reconfirm your existence while in a confused state of mind. Richard Pryor once said his “Higher power was a lamp post” it was something he could use to hold him up while lost in his excess.

Excess here is the theme since this journey around Michael Dean’s work takes you to five different places in the city:

an artist-run-space, a bookstore, a church, a public and a private garden. A constellation of spaces, some private, some public, some indoor or outdoor, framing his work and practice. A portrait of the artist in many words and venues, trying to capture the essence of his oeuvres that oscillates between books and sculptures-making, typography and performances. Mostly outdoor works since Dean’s pieces are initially conceived in his studio’s yard. This is the artist first large-scale presence in France, after showing extensively in the most renowned institutions around the world.

 It’s a very sentimental journey in the streets of Paris that starts by an exhibition at Goswell Road artist-run-space founded by Michael Dean’s childhood friend from Newcastle, Anthony Stephinson and his wife Coralie Ruiz. Two teenagers who did their first exhibition together in the father’s flowers shop of one of them. This exhibition is about parallel paths, the flower shop in Newcastle becomes the son’s artist-run-space in Paris’ tenth district, it relates to their common background and roots, the twenty years in the middle where they lost track and developed their own practices. The heart of this collaboration is the new book of Michael Dean “Smittens for Smoticons” published by Goswell Road. A pathway that ends in the curator’s private garden in the nineteenth district, one sculpture - a smiley half-moon locked on a tree- the size of her son, just to be seen upon request.

In between these two geographical points, there is an intervention at Yvon Lambert bookstore in le Marais, where the artist will present all the artist books he made since his debut, some impossible to find, and an edition specially made for this project. A fiery reading of Michael Dean with his son of his last book “Love Dancing on Hate’s Grave” will take place on October 22nd at Eglise Saint-Eustache organized in collaboration with Move Festival at Centre Pompidou. And finally newly commissioned sculptures will be displayed in the Tuileries garden, inspired by champagne bottles’ muzzles, will appear as a formal hyphen of all these parts. The ultimate fantasy is to create a real tender and twisted map of Paris and endless romantic encounters plotted by the artist and his fans. Let’s get lost. 

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