The “Associations of Pauline Curnier Jardin” is the first survey exhibition dedicated to Pauline Curnier Jardin’s artistic career.
It emerged 20 years ago at the intersection of cinema, performance and the visual arts.
The title announces a story: a story of groups formed throughout the artist’s career, of the affinities she has forged over time, and the feminist, civic, and creative commitments that have shaped her practice.
The expo runs until 25 January at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Antwerp.
The exhibition unfolds as a gathering, a reunion of people and characters, rituals and places, associating to form a hybrid practice driven by a constant search for freedom, transformation and emancipation.
For the first time, an extensive collection of works from the period 2006-2024 has been brought together, including more than twenty films directed by the artist.
These give a clear idea of the range of cinematic styles and genres that she explores: from documentaries to films in theatrical settings, filmed performances to tableaux vivants, tales to experimental fiction.
The exhibition also includes sculptural assemblages, a series of drawings and a selection of large-scale installations resembling stage sets that have contributed to Pauline Curnier Jardin’s renown.
Firmly anchored in reality, yet distorting it to magnify its beauty and contradictions, Pauline Curnier Jardin’s oeuvre positions Europe as a central protagonist — at once setting, silent witness, and co-author. Europe appears through its suburbs — French, Italian, German — its cities — Rome, Berlin, Noisy-le-Sec – its beliefs, vernacular practices, traumas, and festivities.
Two fundamental themes structure her work: the exploration of practices that offer a cultural outlet, such as carnival, travelling cinema, circus, procession or living nativity, and a practice of gathering — in a collective, family, community, association or troupe — that we might see as an essential and privileged tool of her life as a woman and an artist.
From measure to excess, Pauline Curnier Jardin’s films, drawings, performances and installations reveal spaces of truth where personal and official histories lose their hierarchical relationship.
As genuinely cathartic celebrations, her works forge bonds, revealing the shared space between countercultures and loci of power, encouraging us to imagine new possibilities.
The exhibition is curated by Anne-Claire Schmitz, senior curator, M HKA.
The exhibition has been made possible with the support of The French Embassy in Belgium and the Institut Français.
- Photo credit to Encircle Photos
