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Avant-garde artist Ben opens his "souvenir shop" in Nice

2023-05-13T08:47:42.056Z

Highlights: Benjamin Vautier, alias Ben, exhibits for a year in Nice, in a joyfully crazy atmosphere. The 87-year-old creator exhibits more than 500 works at the Anatole Jakovsky International Museum of Naive Art. From May 5 to May 6, 2024, this exhibition brings together a total of 550 works. Ben is one of the best-known representatives of the avant-garde Fluxus movement since his meeting in London, in the early 1960s.


A figure of the Fluxus movement, the 87-year-old creator exhibits more than 500 works at the Anatole Jakovsky International Museum of Naive Art. His own works will rub shoulders with those of his friends and models until May 2024.


«

We are all crazy!": it is under this title that Benjamin Vautier, alias Ben, exhibits for a year in Nice, in a joyfully crazy atmosphere, more than 500 pieces, his own, but also many from his personal collection, signed Combas or complete strangers. From May 5 to May 6, 2024, this exhibition brings together a total of 550 works at the Anatole Jakovsky International Museum of Naive Art. Everything spills over into the garden, with sculptures or installations, such as this ring called to host debates.

Known for his famous slogans written in white handwritten letters on a black background, "I don't know what to say", "Make me swan" or "How do I know if it's art or not?", which have given rise to many derivative products, Ben is also one of the best-known representatives of the avant-garde Fluxus movement since his meeting in London, in the early 1960s, with the main founder of this movement, George Maciunas.

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"It's a failed exhibition, I put all my family memories instead of putting masterpieces," he explained Friday at the opening: "I scraped my bottom of drawer, I found friends, I found souvenirs, and I put them in this souvenir shop," added the artist, now 87 years old. "Each of them has something to say, each brings something, that's what interests me, the pure copier, I eliminate it," he said about this selection which presents the work of visual artists Bernar Venet or Patrick Moya.

The Anatole Jakovsky International Museum of Naive Art is presenting the effervescent exhibition led by Ben until May 2024. CLEMENT MAHOUDEAU, AFP

These works acquired by Ben rub shoulders with his own, more than 300 in total, including several created especially for the occasion. A bit confusing, this exhibition is complemented by objects from the museum's permanent collection, including works by Douanier Rousseau.

Everything is art

In an explosive cocktail, Ben chose to bring together artists like this assistant of Daniel Buren, who had settled Place du Tertre in Montmartre to earn a living by telling "that to be null is to be ahead of others", with complete strangers - including one, bipolar, who came every week to sell Ben a painting -, or on the contrary with hyperrated stars like Robert Combas. "One of the artists I prefer," testified the octogenarian, who had acquired several of his paintings in the 80s.

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"After a first exhibition with him in another place in Nice three years ago, I wanted him to do it again here, in this museum of naive art, and this for a period of one year, which is rare today," explained Robert Roux, deputy mayor of Nice in charge of Culture. "Ben, he is the one who speaks the most ego but he is also the one who has the least, because it is he who highlights others the most by exposing them," said the elected official.

Invited during the opening to perform a performance, peeling a bag of 10 kilos of potatoes, Jean Mas, another figure of the school of Nice, spoke of Ben as an "unavoidable" artist. "We can not ignore everything he has done, even if some say that it is the mess in art, but it does not matter, everything is art, and everything is art (Editor's note: "any tadpole") becomes frog," said this artist between two blows of vegetable peeler and a tirade screaming to wake a dead man. During this year of exhibition, various events, happenings or debates will be held, in the purest tradition of the Fluxus movement where music, poetry and performances play a central role.

Source: lefigaro

All life articles on 2023-05-13

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