Philippe Parreno's exhibitions are living organisms, responsive to their environments and the people within them. Think Robert Rauschenberg's White Paintings (1951), famously described by John Cage as 'airports for lights, shadows, and particles' as multi-dimensional entities powered by an AI. Parreno's upcoming show at Gladstone Gallery is the most recent manifestation of his ongoing contemplation of art as both sentient and sensual.
New and recent works perform an intricate choreography in reaction to multiple stimuli, some as ineffable as the passage of time or shifts in barometric pressure, others as shocking and urgent as climactic change. The transparent acrylic Clock (2023) with its multiple faces animated by gears controlled by a DMX box, adheres to the forward propulsion of time, yet stutters and shifts according to changes in the atmosphere. The video, The Owl in Daylight (2020)—never before exhibited in the U.S.—imagines a CGI-animated waterscape in which light and vapour and a fugitive city appear and disappear algorithmically in concert with actual climactic fluctuations. Part weather station, part imaginary world, this digital work pays homage to the last, unfinished, eponymously titled novel by sci-fi author Philip K. Dick, situated in an alien world without sound that considers the cacophony of Earth as a kind of heaven. The video's generative soundtrack was conceived by composer and sound engineer Nicolas Becker to blend naturalistic noises with abstract echoes of our tech-driven landscape. Also included are Parreno's heliostat sculptures, which capture the movement of sunlight to then reflect it onto a stationary point, transmitting solar energy in the process. Installed in the gallery, they will function as clocks of the room, partnering with the large acrylic timepiece to map the steady melt of time.
Parreno has presented solo exhibitions at Espance Louis Vuitton (2023); La Bourse de Commerce, Paris (2022), Fondation Beyeler, Basel (2021); LUMA, Arles (2021); The Museum of Modern Art, New York (2019); Watari-Um, Tokyo (2019); Gropius Bau, Berlin (2018); Jumex, Mexico City (2017); The Rockbund Art Museum, Shanghai (2017); Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art, Porto (2017); ACMI, Melbourne (2016/17); Hangar Bicocca, Milan (2015/2016), Park Avenue Armory, New York (2015); Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2014/2013); CAC Malaga (2014); Garage Museum of Contemporary Art, Moscow (2013); Fondation Beyeler, Riehen/Basel (2012); Serpentine Gallery, London (2010-2011); Centre for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, New York (2009–10); Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin (2009–10); Kunsthalle Zürich (2009) and Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris (2009). Parreno's work is represented in numerous major museum collections, including Tate, London; MoMA, New York; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Kanazawa Museum of the 21st Century, Japan; Musée d'Art Modern de la Ville de Paris, Paris; SFMOMA, San Francisco; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis. His work was also presented at the Venice Biennale (1993, 1995, 2005, 2007, 2009, 2015, and 2017), Venice Biennale of Architecture (2014), Lyon Biennale (1997, 2003, and 2005), and Istanbul Biennial (2001).
Press release courtesy Gladstone Gallery.
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