Vanités
- Musée Maillol
By the past,
in ancient Greece, the skeleton suggested the passage of
time and the brevity of life. A theme found
in the mosaics of Pompeii. At the time,
the slave whispered in the ear of the Roman general: "Memento Mori"
(Remember that you will die). Vanity is
developed in the late Middle Ages, a time when religion dominates,
whence the idea of purgatory, where wars and epidemics make life
specially ridiculous. The term
"vanity" comes from the words of Ecclesiastes: "Vanity of vanities, all
is vanity." Vanity is a
reflection on life, moralizing, which should lead to redemption, "said
Loic Malle, an art historian who helped design the exhibition. After a
decline in the Renaissance, vanity is experiencing a golden age in the
seventeenth century. In the south
it is often associated with religious scenes. In Northern
Europe, it may be an element of still life. With the
French Revolution, there is a change in the meaning of the concept of
vanity. It was
secularized and became an object that is part of the workshop. Skull "will
crystallize all fears" but has no "promise of eternity or promise of
progress," said Loic Malle. The
exhibition is chronological, but in reverse: it begins with the early
twenty-first century, where the skull is everywhere, on clothing,
jewelry, pubs and even toys. "There's a
whole generation of young artists who is very interested in death
because our society hides it" considers Patrizia Nitti, new artistic
director of the Musée Maillol. For her, "the
exhibition is not sad at all." "It's a way
to tame death," says she. Andy Warhol
painted a series of skulls in bright colors, completely secularized. At the same
time, AIDS, plague of modern times, brought death to the heart of art. Artist
emblematic Briton Damien Hirst is famous for platinum skull set with
8601 diamonds. We will not
see it but at the Maillol Museum presents an image of the skull that
laughs, amid sparkling diamond dust (For the Love of God, Laugh). Damien Hirst
has delivered a "surprise" at the Maillol Museum. Knowing that
exposed one of his skulls covered with flies (Fear of Death), he has
taken another "much more beautiful because it comes complete with its
jaw," said Patrizia Nitti. "A small
wonder. Even his teeth are in wings of flies," said she. Basquiat has
its skulls voodoo cult in his Haitian origins, Annette Messager creates
skulls as children's games, with gloves and crayons. Miquel
Barcelo painted a huge skull in the desert, occupying the entire
canvas. Robert
Mapplethorpe, hit by AIDS, represents himself with a cane pommel shaped
skull. The
exhibition compares three beautiful vanities of the seventeenth
century, three St. Francis chiaroscuro holding a skull in his hands,
leaning back, eyes full of madness in Georges De La Tour (Ecstasy of
Saint Francis), full of passion in the Caravaggio
(Saint Francis in Meditation) and full of pain Zurbaran (St. Francis
kneeling). The theme of
the vanity is in a new eclipse the eighteenth to return to the
nineteenth, after the French Revolution. It Gericault
who invented the vanity with its glorious secular Three skulls painted
in full Napoleonic debacle. In the
twentieth century, Picasso and Braque were built of the skulls in their
lifes. In 1933, the
German Erwin Blumenfeld made a disturbing montage which superimposed a
skull and a photograph of Hitler. The
exhibition assumes the skull all the sauces, the wings of beetles (Jan
Fabre), in packs of Gauloises (Serena Carone), carved fruit and
vegetables (Dimitri Tsykalov). The earliest
work is a small mosaic table covered Pompeii. A skull
symbolizing the body and a butterfly symbolizing the soul are laid on
the wheel of life.
That's life,
Vanities Caravaggio to Damien Hirst, Fondation Dina Vierny -
Musée Maillol, 59-61 Rue de Grenelle, 75007 Paris,
01-42-22-59-58
Every day
except Tuesdays and holidays, 10h30-19h
Rates: 11
€ / 9 €
Until June
28, 2010