PARASOPHIA 京都国際現代芸術祭2015

Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster
b. 1965 in Strasbourg, France; based in Paris and Rio de Janeiro
www.dgf5.com

Works in the exhibition
Lola Montez in Berlin, 2015
HD video, 3 min. 58 sec.
Installed at Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art

Otello 1887, 2015
HD video, 25 min. 31 sec.
Installed at the Annex of the Museum of Kyoto

See all installation views at higher resolution: www.flickr.com/photos/parasophia/sets/72157656870434741

In the late 1980s, after studying at the École du Magasin of the National Center of Contemporary Art in Grenoble, Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster began creating a series of installations that she refers to as her “Rooms.” These works combine elements such as video, light, sound, and furniture to stimulate the viewer’s memories through their senses, and transform rooms into spaces with rich narratives that can almost be described as books in room form. Important aspects of her work include the relationship between the physical and psychological elements that result from the process of creating situational works, as well as the participation of others in these situational works themselves. For these reasons, her works have been described as “relational art.” More recently, Gonzalez-Foerster has been creating works that present deep, tranquil contemplations of the complexly interwoven relationship between images and fiction in cinema, text, books, and language. In 2012, she began working on M.2062, her “opera under construction,” where the artist appears as different characters and personas and delivers lecture/performances using text and music. M.2062 (Scarlett), presented by Parasophia in September 2013, was the fifth version. For Parasophia: Kyoto International Festival of Contemporary Culture 2015, she will be presenting two new video installations: Lola Montez in Berlin, which is based on the eponymous version of M.2062 presented at Circus Cabuwazi in Berlin in 2014, at the Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art, and Otello 1887, which was filmed at the Palacio de Cristal in Madrid during Gonzalez-Foerster’s exhibition SPLENDIDE HOTEL and is based on Verdi’s Otello, at the Annex of the Museum of Kyoto.

• Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art
• Annex, The Museum of Kyoto