French installation artist and composer Céleste Boursier-Mougenot joins us in Melbourne for an exclusive screening and Q&A at NGV International.
NGV audiences may be familiar with Boursier-Mougenot’s work clinamen 2013, which sees white porcelain bowls float upon an intensely blue pool creating a resonant, chiming acoustic soundscape. Held in the NGV Collection, clinamen has been shown at NGV International in 2013 and in 2016.
Beginning with a screening of a selection of films by artist and performer Enna Chaton that respond to Boursier-Mougenot’s acoustic installations, providing a new way to see and hear the works, the evening will conclude with an intimate conversation and Q&A with Boursier-Mougenot hosted by curator Dr Emily Cormack.
Welcome & Introduction
6–6.15pm
Screening of films by Enna Chaton
6.15–6.45pm
Conversation / Q&A
6.45–7.15pm
Speakers
Céleste Boursier-Mougenot is a French artist and composer who has gained worldwide recognition for his acoustic installations that use nature and the rhythms of everyday life to investigate the relationship between sound, space and movement. Using domestic or natural materials, he creates installations that immerse the viewer in a multi-faceted set of sensory experiences, and invite a renewed and refined appreciation of our perceptual environment. Boursier-Mougenot represented France at the 56th Venice Biennale in 2015, and has had one-person exhibitions in international museums and galleries including the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal (2015); Centre-Pompidou Metz (2015); Barbican Centre, London (2010); Hangar Bicocca, Milan (2011); La Maison Rouge, Paris (2010); Pinacoteca do Estado, São Paulo (2009); and FRAC, Reims (2008). His work is represented in collections such as the Centre Pompidou, Paris; the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne; The Israel Museum, Jerusalem; The San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art; The Fonds National d’Art Contemporain, France; and various French national collections.
Dr Emily Cormack is a curator and writer with a special interest in how art operates within the public realm. She has curated over 30 exhibitions including From Will to Form: The 2018 TarraWarra Biennial; Monument to Now: MoreArt 2020, an exhibition of temporal public art, Melbourne; Primavera 2016 at the Museum of Contemporary Art; Co-curator, City Within the City, Artsonje Center, Seoul, South Korea (2011); Co-Curator, Still Vast Reserves, Magazzino d’Arte Moderna, Rome, Italy (2009-10). She was the Curator of the 2022 Melbourne Art Fair. Cormack has a PhD from Monash University and has published extensively writing articles, reviews, chapters and catalogues on artists including Marco Fusinato, Dane Mitchell, Agatha Gothe-Snape, Jean-Luc Moulene, Sally Smart and many more. She has an independent curatorial practice that specialises in generating encounters with art in the public realm. She has curated a new collection of permanent site-responsive works for 101 Collins Street, including a major new work by Céleste Boursier-Mougenot.
About the Filmmaker
Enna Chaton is a French artist, photographer, videographer and performer working primarily with nudity – in public, outdoors, and in the studio. Her performances feature people invited to explore physical and psychic territories unknown to them, through the singular form of exposure. To facilitate this exploration, Chaton goes nude with her participants and together they form spaces of tolerance, experimentation, and creativity, creating a world out of step with that of the everyday. Such democratic nudity sweeps away norms and stereotypes, and one is able to reveal themselves as different from how their daily life would suggest. In presenting these “anti-models,” Chaton proposes a gentle and brutal confrontation with oneself, with others, and society-at-large.
Céleste Boursier-Mougenot has created a new work for 101 Collins Street, with support from 101 Collins Street. His travel to Australia has received support from the French Consulate of Australia. His accommodation has been generously provided by the Robin Boyd Foundation. Boursier-Mougenot is represented by Paula Cooper Gallery, New York.
Please be advised the films being screened during this event contain sensitive content including nudity. Viewer discretion is advised.