Samuel Bianchini and Mari Linnman collaborate for the book “À DISTANCES – Œuvrer dans les espaces publics” published by Les Presses du Réel within the collection Société des Nouveaux Commanditaires. The book reflects questions about the creation of artwork in the public space.
In this book, Samuel Bianchini and Mari Linnman continue their work engaged many years ago. They question different ways of doing artworks in public spaces analysing their mutual positions and a case study: At Distances (2011 – 2014), a work they have produced together as part of the New Sponsors of the Fondation de France for the House of Gesture and Image, in Les Halles, in the heart of Paris.
In “À DISTANCES – Œuvrer dans les espaces publics”, the authors highlight the complexity and challenges in the realization and exploitation of artworks in public spaces. How can we provoke, in these places characterized by numerous solicitations and activities, aesthetic experiences and how can we constitute a public? Without falling into the monumental or the decorative, how can we conceive works that subtly challenge our senses or provoke contagion, or even induce practices that are alternative to the usual uses?
The authors
Samuel Bianchini is an artist and associate professor at the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs—Paris (EnsAD) / PSL Research University Paris. Supporting the principle of an “operational aesthetic,” he works on the relationship between the most forward-looking technological “dispositifs”, modes of representation, new forms of aesthetic experiences, and sociopolitical organizations, often in collaboration with scientists and natural science and engineering research laboratories. His works are regularly shown in Europe and across the world: Nuit Blanche Toronto 2016, Medialab Prado (Madrid), Palais de Tokyo (Paris), Kunsthaus PasquArt (Biel), Art Basel, Institut Français of Tokyo, Stuk Art Center (Leuven), Fiac, Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris), Deutsches Hygiene-Museum (Dresden), National Museum of Contemporary Art (Athens), just to mention a few.
Mari Linnman is a curator and mediator of the New sponsors of the Fondation de France. She collaborated, for the production of works questioning the public spaces, with numerous artists, among which John Armleder, Alain Bublex, Yona Friedman, Ann Veronica Janssens, Martha Rosler, Claude Rutault, Jessica Stockholder, Superflex, and Jean-Luc Vilmouth. Mari Linnman co-directs the Contexts Association Gallery in Paris and is part of the artistic team that accompanies the extension of the T3 Nord tramway line in Paris.
