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APRIL - MAY 2015 The bimonthly electronic journal of the Basil and Elise Goulandris Foundation
EDITORIAL TEAM
Georgia Alevizaki, Paraskevi Gerolymatou, Andreas Georgiadis, Maria Koutsomallis, Alexandra Papakostopoulou, Kleio Panourgias, Irene Stratis Designed and edited by
Τ 210 - 7252896 www.moca-andros.gr | www.goulandris.gr
CONTENTS
IN PLACE OF A PROLOGUE
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By Kyriakos Koutsomallis, Director of the Basil and Elise Goulandris Foundation
P R E S E N TAT I O N
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MAN RAY - Visages of the Woman Presentation of the upcoming art exhibition at Museum of Contemporary Art, in Andros
I N S I D E T H E F O U N D AT I O N ' S P E R M A N E N T C O L L E C T I O N
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Yorgos Bouzianis, Portrait of Artist's Wife
FORMER BEGF SCHOLARS
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Konstantinos Chrysos
I N T E R N AT I O N A L L I S T I N G S / C U LT U R E A list of major art shows around the world
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I N P L A C E O F A P R O LO G U E
In this twelfth issue of our electronic magazine it is with particular pleasure that we welcome our friends in an effort to share information regarding the summer exhibition on Andros that is devoted to the distinguished American photographer Man Ray. The exhibition is thematic concentrating on the Woman and her visages. More information is available in the adjacent column. In this issue we also present a very interesting interview with the architect Konstantinos Chrysos, a former Goulandris Foundation Scholarship holder who lives and works abroad but maintains his contact with and interest in Greece. We would like to thank you, our increasing number of friends for your continued interest. We remain at your disposal via all social media to share your impressions and any other observations you would like to make. Kyriakos Koutsomallis Director
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Man Ray and the visages of Woman is the temporary exhibition being hosted by the Basil and Elise Goulandris Foundation in the Chora on Andros during summer 2015. This presentation is dedicated to the eminent American artist Man Ray and relates exclusively to the Woman and the way in which he approached and traced her various and multiple visages through his lens. Apart from a painter and one of the leading figures of the great Surrealist movement Man Ray was also a distinguished maestro of the art of the camera to which, to a great extent, he owes his fame. Man Ray distinguished himself within the art of photography by highlighting original and unprecedented themes that surprise, enchant, amaze, excite. Within the scope of his creative range after 1921 when he abandoned America and settled in Paris, he placed the Woman as a dominant figure in his art; anonymous or celebrity, muse or mistresses, familiar or strange, distinguished or unknown and unrecognised, even as a figment of his imagination, she is represented in the means and ways of all categories. If Man Ray gave photography its aristocratic titles, Man Ray is the one who, may years before, offered it elements that were unprecedented and innovative and promoted it to a level that was equal to and on a par with the visual arts. In his own words, what artists did with colour and light he did with light and the various chemical alchemies he invented himself. Through this impressive panorama that covers an artistic career that exceeds fifty years (consisting of 150 works from all categories: photographs, paintings, engravings, drawings, sculptures and ready-mades), visitors will navigate through a thrilling array of personalities from the arts and literary worlds, movie stars such as Eva Gardner and Catherine Deneuve, the famous bohemian Kiki de Montparnasse, his mistress and photographer Lee Miller, the art lover and collector Peggy Guggenheim, the writer Gertrude Stein and many more popular personalities from the arts, intellectual and Parisian socialite worlds. Visitors will also be able to discover that the Surrealist movement began playing a defining role already from 1925 when Man Ray, alongside Max Ernst, Juan Mir贸, Pablo Picasso and Jean Arp, participated in the first surrealist exhibition in Paris.
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T H E M U S E S O F MA N R AY
Women distinct, different to each other, with intensely authentic personalities, Man Ray’s muses accompanied him in life and throughout his artistic career. The exuberant Kiki de Montparnasse, the slender Lee Miller, the independent MÊret Oppenheim, the smiling Adrienne Fidelin, the bland Juliet Browner, all inspired some of his most innovative approaches in photographs, photograms and short films for the silent cinema. Going against his surrealist convictions, Man Ray lived his every love story to the full and, in the end, burnt his wings, like Icarus. The love he cultivated for his muses is surpassed only by his admiration for them so he deified that which charmed him the most in each of them presenting them as the epitome of femininity.
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T H E “ MA N R AY S T U D I O ” In depicting woman, Man Ray managed to capture the unexplored aspect of his model and revealed a truth that is not always pleasant… Through his lens anonymous models and celebrities alike give their own testimony. On occasion of the photographic portrait of James Joyce, he photographed numerous intellectuals, artists but also the era’s aristocrats and celebrities, highlighting his ability as celebrity portraitist. He shot the first fashion photographs for Paul Poiret and portraits of designers such as Coco Chanel, Elsa Schiaparelli, Madeleine Vionnet, Lucien Lelong and Jeanne Lanvin and their creations. The innovative approach of his shots established him and initiated collaborations with Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar and Vanity Fair. Although photography was viewed by him as a means for making a living he displayed high professionalism installing a unique lighting system in his studio. At rue Val-de Grâce 8, Man Ray’s studio as the nerve centre for the experimentations of the Parisian avant garde reached its heyday during the 1930s. Here Man Ray shot the exceptional personalities of the era and set a course that inspires artistically to this day.
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THE WOMAN OF DESIRE I had gloated over reproductions of Greek statues and Ingres’s nudes, had made drawings of them ostensibly as exercises in art, but inwardly knowing full well it was the woman that interested me Man Ray Despite his reserve, the silhouette and details of the anatomy of the woman became the object of Man Ray’s most daring experimentations. By capturing an isolated part of the female body through his lens he managed to translate it into a vehicle of sensuality, an element that could similarly be highlighted by a glance or a smile. Man Ray captures that which makes the woman so impressive and desirable and confronts her femininity from a perspective that relates closer to sculpture. Of all the parts of the female anatomy, it is the hand he depicts more often. To this part of the body, the means of expression of every artist, Man Ray imbues life and praises it as the most pleasant, elegant and familiar feature of female nature.
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THE SURREALIST WOMAN Although he never signed any of the Surrealist manifestos, Man Ray participated in the group’s activities and exhibitions but also crumpling the surrealist Woman with the same mastery. Next to the movement’s priestesses and their free, unrepressed way of life, he is enchanted by this almost hysterical creature, the Woman than incarnates spontaneity, love, the dream. Man Ray presented his own mannequin at the opening of the International Surrealism Exhibition in 1938 at the Galerie Beaux-Arts in Paris in a series of seventeen window dolls entitled ‘The Most Beautiful Streets in Paris’ (Les plus belles rues de Paris). Each one is decorated to correspond with the imaginary street name it bears. Man Ray, as the exhibition’s photographer, depicted the mannequins under a membrane and published them in an edition published by Petithory entitled Les Mannequins (The Mannequins). In 1970 he expressed the totality of the impulses and emotions of the Woman in 14 etchings on occasion of the exhibition at the XXmème Siècle gallery in Paris. Man Ray chose the title The Ballad of the Ladies Beyond Time (La Ballade des Dames hors du Temps), in a direct reference to André Breton’s 1934 text Le Visage de la Femme (The Visages of the Woman).
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I N S I D E T H E F O U N D AT I O N ' S PERMANENT COLLECTION
Yiorgos Bouzianis (1885-1959)
Portrait of Artist's Wife Oil on canvas, 101 x 70,5 cm., 1938
Conveying the human form in the works of the artist, leads us inevitably to the female form. The Woman-symbol dominates as an image and subject of creative inspiration. Bouzianis’ Woman-symbol never reaches the level of myth because this is not the aim. What is attempted through various representation is the anatomy of the personality of the female and the function of the mother-woman. Beyond these basic axes of interest, Bouzianis also sees the woman freer, one could almost say more carefree, more down-toearth, in the way that a man feels the natural attraction to the opposite sex; this can be identified in several nudes. […] In the case of the human figure, space participates actively in the achievement of the representation. Sometimes it is dealt with as a unified comprehensive space and others as an expanse of representational sheet-music upon which the artist lowers and heightens the intensity of the brushstroke, in an apparently atonic rhythm but, essentially with the proportions and tonal frequencies that, in the end, define a composition in accordance with the artist’s expressive form. […] Another very characteristic element in Bouzianis’ human form is the formalisation of the hands which is all but arbitrary in its contribution of the general composition of the figure. Often the distinct, every time, shaping of the hands defines the position and psychology of the represented form. The hands are almost always down, touching each other and either circling around the waist or spread out without this being imposed by an external object or cause. This is a mannerist type introduced by the expressionists. The painter sees the hands, sometimes clenched between the legs and others existing as the floating organs of a human form whose movement depends directly on the fate to which the main active extremities have been abandoned to! Waiting (Anamoni) and Resignation (Paretisi) are the two axes that basically define Bouzianis’ representations of the human form. It is within this framework that every composition is built, sometimes defined with intricate thematic richness and others confined to the simplicity of infinite space.
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FORMER BEGF SCHOLARS
Konstantinos Chrysos BEGF scholar 2002-2003, architecture.
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At the end of the 20th century, François Ascher spoke of meta-cities. Are we experiencing this phenomenon today within the European urban landscape or, more specifically, in Greece? Meta-cities are a reality on the global urban map, as are “urban nomads”, the portion of their inhabitants that experience the “meta” at its fullest. The intensive addition over the previous decade of state-of-the-art communication methods to ever-evolving transportation means has created social transformation and a release from national and urban boundaries, has created social mobility. New work and living conditions, mean that towns or even parts of towns around the world are often connected to and working with each other closer than neighbouring districts in the same town. I would probably be hesitant to characterise the participation of the Greek urban landscape in this global community. Greek cities are only just upgrading or examining ways to upgrade urban mobility (trams lines, regional, suburban trains, etc.). The only exception is Athens that is a more mature metropolis but even in this case metropolitan development has not reached its full potential (suburban unification with neighbouring cities and islands). On the other hand, the Greek coastline is being upgraded into an affordable holiday destination within the meta-city network and part of the “work-residence” bipolar where holidays are transformed into “living away from the home”. Again, because of modern telecommunication networks and tools, the enjoyment of the Greek landscape is now possible by remaining “selectively” connected to work commitments. Characteristic phenomena are the increase in direct
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1,2: Stations, sea bus service, maquette and virtual display 3. Multipurpose place, materiality playground for carteco, idea for the exterior and virtual display 4. IllyBlend - stand of a coffee company, corporate identity
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flights to the Greek islands that bypass the Athenian urban web, the establishment of a big new airport in Crete (Kasteli) currently under discussion and the leasing and upgrading of a number of regional Greek airports. How are the repercussions of the crisis manifesting themselves in European architectural activity? Every crisis is an opportunity for the promotion of things new and advanced; of something new that occurs from contemporary factors and leads the way to its next crisis. So global architectural practices were judged for their preparedness and flexibility to follow contemporary collaborative practices that were occurring in other professional sector for years. One would be inclined to say that the decrease or even cessation of new projects is the main phenomenon of the crisis. On the contrary, this crisis reaches deeper and challenges the architect’s work and partnership basis. Inspiration is no longer enough for the creation of a building because architects are no longer called upon simply to design a building that is “taller, bigger, more environmentally sound.” They are being asked to respond to far more complex social, financial, technological and environmental challenges that go beyond the strict confines of the drawing board, as happened in the past, and respond in ways that achieve “social sustainability” in all design scales. The architect regains his initial position and is called upon to coordinate collaborating sociologists, economists, technologists; his synthetical thinking is called upon to replace technocratic thought.
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5,6,7. Heliometer - installation, Green Design Festival 2. 8. Floratile - parametric design and production of a 3D space panel.
Could you give us an outline of your own thoughts on the much talked-about Re-Think Athens project? Over recent decades architecture in Greece experienced an introvert and non-productive prosperity. It was consumed between an academic quest for the “audience” that negated all reason for production and an over-production of the “private” within a framework of prosperity and over-building. It was not promoted abroad and did not participate in international architectural discussions and pursuits even if there were notable thoughts and projects. Within this framework both the state and the audience came second and no one gave a thought to Greek towns and cities. Within this framework Re-Thinks Athens alongside a few other projects and actions have brought the state back to the foreground (e.g. Thessaloniki Sea Front). This is absolutely legitimate and for this reason alone I believe this effort should be seen in a positive light. Of course, in practice there are respected and correct opinions that support or are against the practicality of the proposal but none of these is wrong in itself and can only be judged by the end result. At the same time both sides share the fact that existing conditions are not ideal for the centre of a city like Athens and something needs to be done. That’s the point I would like to make: let’s do something and judge the result. Let us not become involved in endless discussions on the ideal, like in the past and negate “the action.” After the “action” we can judge the success of the effort and evolve or correct it if necessary. What the realisation of such a project must offer is not simply beautification or the restructuring of some of the city’s traffic routes but Athens’ participation in the global discussion on the evolution of aged urban centres. Rethink Athens will bring about changes to the immediate way we experience the centre but, long term, it will also change the way we perceive the city in a broader sense as part of it. In fact, recent thinking on urban evolution promotes the importance of the pedestrian and the neighbourhood over mass transportation and the private car.
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FORMER BEGF SCHOLARS Cities on top of cities, over-building and the degradation of contemporary cities is an undeniable reality. Is this a road without return or is there hope? The development of urban centres over recent decades has followed socio-political developments in the lives of their citizens. Every continent’s, every country’s urban environments evolve at different rates depending on the maturity of each society at urban level. Urban conscience mainly in the western world has been upgraded in recent years. It has promoted the term urban sustainability to the next level since the 1990s and the coining of an environmental conscience where reduced emissions and better energy saving became an end in itself. We are now moving on to a more interactive sustainability the responds better to urban structures and the citizen (Smart City strategy). The application of ubiquitous computing in cities enhances the effectiveness of existing infrastructures and social prosperity and reduces the cost and consumption of resources. The desired outcome is the active and effective participation of citizens in decision making. In a more mature perspective the spread towards the suburbs is being reconsidered and with targeted interventions city administrators are upgrading and enriching the aged centres of their cities via friendlier public spaces and more residences, supporting 8
sustainable transportation and the concept of the neighbourhood (Highline project New York City, ΝΥ). At the same time and if we look to the countryside we see countries that, by upgrading telecommunications networks with cutting-edge technologies, are enhancing its connections to urban centres by incorporating them virtually into their transactional space. The aim is to support and create a new type of work focus which runs parallel to the support for the promotion of agricultural professions. This accomplishes their tele-urban autonomy within a broader network. This relationship allows professionals who were once confined within the boundaries of the city to remain professionally active within urban frameworks while enjoying the countryside (Silicon Valley in the Polder, NL). In which of your projects can you “see” yourself coexisting with the desired harmony you and every modern-day person seeks? The harmony every modern-day person seeks is something absolutely personal and ideal that is not connected to architecture. Architecture is an expression of the collective that seeks to be the “common means” for the co-existence of all “people (users) in harmony (in the building).” Architecture is the sustainable compromise of social, financial, cultural and environmental parameters and serves “the collective individually.” By perceiving architecture in this way my team’s proposal for the architectural competition for the stops of the Urban Sea Transportation of Thessaloniki sought to convey the necessary harmony of all these parameters. The aim was to create a landmark for this new means of transport which could also exist in harmony with the waterfront. At the same time, the “integral” design allowed the creation of an “optimal” shell that responds to a series of parameters. From the urban nature of the district where each stop exists, to the platform’s orientation and the view towards the city or the sea horizon.” The bioclimatic characteristics of the proposal are not reference points because they form self-evident compositional elements of any contemporary functionally sustainable building.
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INTERNATIONAL LISTINGS / CULTURE
LONDON
National Gallery Sansovino Frames
«Frames in Focus: Sansovino Frames» is the first in a series of exhibitions on frames for artworks which brings together 30 exceptional and characteristic examples from Venice and Veneto. Duration of exhibition: 1/4 – 13/9/2015 www.nationalgallery.org.uk
LONDON
THE COURTAULD GALLERY Goya: The Witches and Old Women Album
This important exhibition reunites for the first time all surviving drawings from Goya's witches and old women album, shedding light on a very private, personal aspect of the great painter's practice. In these works, dreams and nightmares, superstitions and the trials of old age become a filter for Goya's unique vision. Duration of exhibition: 26 /02 - 25/05/2015. www.courtauld.ac.uk
LONDON
Estorick Collection of Modern Italian Art, Modigliani: A Unique Artistic Voice
This exhibition includes 30 drawings by the artist, several from the collection of his close friend Paul Alexandre – his only patron at the beginning of his career – and from other private collections. Duration of exhibition: 15/4 – 28/06/2015 www.estorickcollection.com
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PA R I S
GRAND PALAIS: Velásquez
The exhibit, jointly organized by the RMNGrand Palais, the Musée du Louvre, and the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, presents Velásquez's portraits of Spanish royalty. Duration of exhibition: 25/03 - 07/07/2015. www.grandpalais.fr
PA R I S
CENTRE POMPIDOU: Le Corbusier Mesures de l' homme
A retrospective of the work of Charles-Edouard Jeanneret, known as Le Corbusier. Visionary architect and urban planner, modernist theorist but also a painter and sculptor, Le Corbusier left his mark on the 20th century through the subversion of the architectural creation.
PA R I S
FONDATION louis vuitton Keys to a passion
Louis Vuitton foundation inaugurates its new building at Paris, presenting about 30 masterpieces from european museums. Duration of exhibition: 01/04 – 06/07/2015 www.fondationlouisvuitton.fr
Duration of exhibition: 29/4 - 3/8/2015 www.centrepompidou.fr
PA R I S
Jacquemart-AndrĂŠ Museum from giotto to caravaggio
Italian Art masterpieces from 14th to 17th century come from Italy, some of them for very first time in France. Duration of exhibition: 27/03-20/07/2015 www.giotto-caravage.com
AMSTERDAM
Rijksmuseum: Late Rembrandt
This is the first major exhibition to investigate the late years in the Dutch master's career. It brings together more than 100 paintings, drawings, and prints on loan from the collections of many international museums. Duration of exhibition: 12/02 - 17/5/2015 www.rijksmuseum.nl
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INTERNATIONAL LISTINGS / CULTURE
VENICE
56th BIENNALE
The opening of the now established Venice Biennale is on 9 May. It will run until 22 November 2015. www.labiennale.org
ROME
SCUDERIE DEL QUIRINALE MATISSE. ARABESQUE
The exhibition aims to offer visitors an overview of the artist’s influence from the East – an Orient which, through various artifices, arabesques and colours, suggests a vast space, a truly sculptural plain that imbues his composition with a new depth and releases him from the necessity of perspective and “accuracy of representation”, creating a vacuum of vibrant colours, in the notion of the clean surface. Duration of exhibition: 5/3 – 21/6/2015 www.scuderiequirinale.it
MADRID
Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum Paul Delvaux: a walk with love and death
An exhibition exploring the work of Belgian painter Paul Delvaux (1897-1994), whose painting, initially an example of Flemish Expressionism, would eventually come under the influence of Surrealism. The show brings together more than fifty of the painter's works, to be found in private and public collections in Belgium, most prominently the Ghêne Collection. Duration of exhibition: 24/2 - 07/06/2015 www.museothyssen.org
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MUNICH
haus der kunst Louise Bourgeois. Structures of Existence: The Cells
Among the most innovative and challenging sculptural works in Louise Bourgeois' extensive oeuvre are the "Cells", a series of architectural spaces that preoccupied her for nearly 20 years. Duration of exhibition: 27/2 – 2/8/2015 www.hausderkunst.de
MADRID
Prado museum: Ten Picassos from the Kunstmuseum Basel
The Prado Museum presents ten Picasso masterpieces from the collection of the Kunstmuseum, Basel, which date from between 1906 and 1967. Duration of exhibition: 18/3 - 15/9/2015 www.museodelprado.es
BARCELONA
MUSEU PICASSO de BARCELONA
The show includes works by Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dali. Picasso supported Dali during the early stages in his career and in the 1930s helped him organize his trip to the USA. After the end of the Spanish Civil War, Dali spoke and wrote about Picasso, describing his own works as a tribute to Picasso's painting. Duration of exhibition: 20/3 - 28/06/2015 www.museupicasso.bcn.cat
milan
Palazzo Morando Brassaï – Pour l’ amour de Paris
First exhibition of transylvanian photographer Brassai, narrating his beloved city, Paris, where he lived for more than 50 years. Duration of exhibition:: 20/03 – 28/06/2015 www.civicheraccoltestoriche.mi.it/
new y or k
METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART Van Gogh – Irises and Roses
This exhibition reunites the four paintings for the first time since the artist’s death and coincides chronologically with the flowering of the flowers that drew his attention. Duration of exhibition: 12/05 – 16/08/2015 www.metmuseum.org
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