Société Anonyme
Société Anonyme January 24 – March 16, 2008 The exhibition “Société Anonyme” at Kadist Art Foundation is the continuation of the eponymous show that took place at the contemporary art center Le Plateau in Paris between March 14 and May 13, 2007. This second stage of the project will present a number of works and developments produced by the various artists and protagonists of “Société Anonyme,” following the research and discussions conducted during the first exhibition. Kadist Art Foundation thus offers to go on and further with the reflection initiated by the curators of “Société Anonyme,” Thomas Boutoux, Natasa Petresin and François Piron, on how to make an exhibition/institution both a pertinent and productive context for the artists to develop new research and works, and a situation that promotes discussion and the inauguration of new communities of interests and aspirations among its audience. For “Société Anonyme,” part of the exhibition space of the Kadist Art Foundation will be converted into a bookstore: Section 7 Books, a new infrastructure created by Thomas Boutoux and François Piron with artist Oscar Tuazon and art critic Benjamin Thorel, and that was inspired by b_books, the cooperative Berlin bookstore and participant in Société Anonyme’s first phase. Section 7 Books offers a selection of magazines and books rarely visible in the French artistic context, and is an attempt to play an active role in the circulation of knowledge, debates, and writings on art, elaborated here or elsewhere in the world. At Kadist Art Foundation, the bookstore will serve as a context for the presentation of the works produced by 16 Beaver Group (New York), b_books (Berlin), Chto Delat / What is to be done? (Saint Petersburg), Erick Beltran (Mexico), Nico Dockx & Friends (Antwerp), tranzit (Prague), and What, How & for Whom? (Zagreb), since the “Société Anonyme” exhibition at Le Plateau. It will also host a series of events and projects by artists and producers of the French art scene (such as Editions Mix, or the new art journal Rosa B.) on the ideas and practices that constitute the backbone of “Société Anonyme:” hospitality, new institutionalism, self-organization, intellectual sociality, the economics of art today, the culture of enthusiasm, the modalities for circulating and sharing ideas and information, political consciousness… In this space as well, a series of dinners will be organized every Sunday night. Each dinner will be dedicated to a guest and a specific subject: cinema and politics, with Dmitry Vilenski from What is To Be Done?; the organization of discourse, with Erick Beltran; collaborative practices, with François Bucher from 16 Beaver group; how to rethink a contemporary art institution today, be it a public institution, with Emily Pethick, director of Casco Office for Art, Design and Theory, in Utrecht ; or a private one, with Zhang Wei and Hu Fang, directors of Vitamin Creative Space, Shanghai/Beijing. A series of booklets documenting these collective conversations will be published on-site. This program of events at Kadist Art Foundation will thus make “Société Anonyme,” once again, a situation of continuous activity and exchange. “Société Anonyme” is a project realized with the support of American Center Foundation, and in collaboration with Le Plateau/Frac Ile-de-France, Paris.