Exposition « La vie est un film » Ben et ses invités au 109
Exposition du 15 juin au 19 octobre 2019
Communiqué de presse
Pour célébrer le centenaire des studios de la Victorine, la ville de Nice programme Nice 2019, L’odys-sée du cinéma, une année entière d’expositions et d’événements visant à valoriser l’histoire du cinéma et la production cinématographique actuelle à Nice. Le 109, sur le site des anciens abattoirs, route de Turin, est un lieu aux dimensions hors normes converti par la municipalité en pôle de création contemporaine.
Au sein de ce vivier artistique, la Ville de Nice et le collectif d’artistes La Station, avec le soutien d’Éva Vau- tier, invitent Ben Vautier pour une grande exposition d’été titrée : La vie est un film. Plus de 500 œuvres de Ben, retraçant 50 ans de création, seront installées dans la grande halle de plus de 2000 mètres carrés, qu’il a choisi de partager avec des invités, artistes, amis de longue date ou jeunes créateurs. Cet espace en per-pétuel mouvement accueillera production filmée, événements, performances et débats, si chers à l’artiste.
Figure artistique majeure de la seconde moitié du XXe siècle, Ben est connu pour ses actions et sespeintures. Sa production, à la fois réflexion philosophique et impertinente sur l’art, intègre notre quotidiendans ce qu’il a de plus particulier. L’éthnisme, l’ego ou la vérité constituent également des questionnements chers à son œuvre.
L’histoire de Ben et son art sont profondément ancrés dans le territoire niçois. Il a quatorze ans quand ils’installe à Nice avec sa mère. Dix ans plus tard, à la fin des années 50, il ouvre une boutique de disquesd’occasion, 32 rue Tonduti de L’Escarène. Rapidement, il en transforme la façade en accumulant quantité d’objets. Le Magasin de Ben est né. Ce lieu de rencontres et d’expositions devient le rendez-vous des prin- cipaux artistes de l’École de Nice : Ben est convaincu que « l’art doit être nouveau et apporter un choc ».Dès 1959, il réalise de nombreuses performances, dont « Je signe la vie » ou « Regardez-moi cela suffit »sur la Promenade des Anglais. En 1963, il invite George Macunias à Nice pour le premier Festival Mondial Fluxus et Art Total en France. Acteur historique de ce mouvement, à cette occasion, Ben signe Nice « œuvre d’art ouverte » sur le Mont Alban.
Lorsque le Magasin de Ben intègre la Collection Permanente du Centre Georges-Pompidou en 1975, il transfère ses activités chez lui, sur la colline de Saint-Pancrace. Ben poursuit l’organisation d’expositions avec notamment Supports/Surfaces, la Figuration Libre et lance les premiers débats Pour ou contre.
Très impliqué dans la scène contemporaine, Ben soutient depuis toujours de jeunes artistes, encourage lesrencontres, et donne son point de vue sur l’actualité, au départpar des tracts, des affiches et journaux, au- jourd’hui par des newsletters riches et régulières.
L’événement Nice 2019 : L’odyssée du cinéma, résonne aussi comme un appel à l’importante pro-duction iconographique de Ben. Caméra au poing depuis 60 ans, il a constitué un fonds filmique considé- rable, suivant l’évolution des techniques, leurs supports et leurs usages. Aux terrasses de cafés ou lors d’évé-nements artistiques, il capte des moments, interpelle de nombreux anonymes et artistes qu’il convoque surl’instant.
Plusieurs événements seront organisés pendant la durée de l’exposition avec des projections de cinéma en plein air, des performances, des ateliers et des concerts. Moment phare de cette exposition, la soirée du ver- nissage sera également le lancement de la saison 3 d’Éclairage Public, un week-end jalonné de rendez-vous créatifs et conviviaux réunissant toutes les pratiques des acteurs artistiques et culturels implantés au 109. Les concerts qui feront suite au vernissage, le vendredi 14 juin, rassembleront des artistes d’expressions niçoiseet occitane, Nux Vomica et Mossu T & Papet J (Massilia Sound System), témoins vivants et festifs des cultures régionales, autre sujet fondamental dans la réflexion de Ben. Placé au centre d’une rétrospective ambitieuseet panoramique sur la création à Nice, c’est un Ben libre comme il l’a toujours été, et foisonnant d’idées qui fera son cinéma total.
Ben – Parcours historique
L’exposition s’ouvre par une partie historique présentant une sélection d’œuvres clés de Ben des années 1958 à 1978. Ces témoignages retracent la quête d’un langage formel personnel qui mène aux premièresécritures. Au départ simples signalétiques, les affiches produites dans son magasin lancent des appels auxréunions, rencontres et échanges. Épine dorsale de la communauté artistique à Nice, le Magasin de Ben devient la source d’expérimentation, de gestes et d’actions, au même titre que la Promenade des Anglais, la rue et les bistrots. Il entame ainsi des actions de rue, dans la lignée du mouvement Fluxus, qu’il importe en France et dont il devient l’un des grands protagonistes.
À la fin des années 50, Ben signe tout, s’appropriant ainsi, par ses images et ses actions, le monde comme un tout. Pour illustrer ces années, des documents de l’époque sont présentés : affiches, archivesphotographiques et vidéos.
Recherche des formes / bananes et premières écritures (1955-1967)
Lorsque Ben débute sa carrière artistique, au milieu des années 1950, il se frotte à toutes les théories et pratiques dans le but premier de trouver un langage formel personnel, d’inventer quelque chose d’inédit, au-delà du répertoire existant. Dès 1955, il retient la forme, à la fois abstraite et phallique, de la banane, qu’il déclare aussitôt comme sa création personnelle et réalise toute une série de dessins, sur différents supports, à l’encre de Chine sur papier.
À partir de 1958, Ben découvre le potentiel des écritures. Au départ dans son magasin de disques d’occasion, celles-ci sont à la fois des informations destinées aux visiteurs et des écrits publicitaires, comme « Le Bon Lait », ou même des marques, telles que Coca-Cola. Les panneaux d’information sont alors faits de bois et écrits à la peinture à l’huile. Plus tard, il développe sa propre technique, en écrivant directement sur latoile, avec une pipette remplie de peinture acrylique, traçant une nouvelle calligraphie distinctive. Le signifié prend le dessus sur le signifiant.
Le Magasin (1958-1973)
Le Magasin, œuvre de Ben conservée actuellement au Centre Georges-Pompidou, reflète la vitalité dece magasin de disques qui faisait aussi fonction de point de rencontre pour la scène artistique niçoise, degalerie, de lieu d’exposition et de manifestation pour tous types de performances.
Dans les années 1950, le magasin de Ben est non seulement l’espace artistique le plus vivant de la ville mais aussi la galerie offrant l’éventail le plus large d’expressions artistiques. La programmation de Ben est ouverte aux nouveautés et expérimentions, ancrée sur un réseau régional d’artistes. Le magasin de Ben est l’un des lieux porteur de l’Ecole de Nice et à partir de 1963, le point de départ de nombreuses actions Fluxus, dont il devient le quartier général.
À cette époque déjà, Ben s’intéresse à la théorie de l’ethnisme de François Fontan dont il sera l’un des disciples les plus fervents. C’est encore une fois au Magasin que se retrouve le mouvement engagé notamment en faveur des minorités linguistiques et culturelles – une question qui, pour Ben, n’a en rien perdu de son actualité.
Fluxus
En 1962 à Londres, pendant le Festival of Misfits, Ben rencontre Georges Maciunas, fondateur et personnage central de Fluxus. Plus qu’un mouvement, Fluxus est un état d’esprit, un espace de partage, d’amitié, dans lequel vont se reconnaître des dizaines d’artistes de toutes nationalités. Ils proposent un art total expérimental qui réunit de multiples langages artistiques par leur volonté d’abolir le fossé entre l’art et la vie.
Invité au Festival par Daniel Spoerri, Ben s’expose comme sculpture vivante pendant 15 jours et nuits dans la vitrine de laGallery One. L’année suivante, dans le prolongement de cettecollaboration, Ben organise à Nice la dernière étape d’une tournée européenne, un Festival Mondial Fluxus et Art Total. Il fonde par la suite un groupe niçois, le Théâtre d’Art Total, déclarant que le théâtre n’est pas sur scène, mais dans la rue, dans la vie.
Les actions de ce groupe se déroulent sur la Promenade des Anglais et un concert est organisé dans le salon de l’Hôtel Scribe. Au Théâtre de l’Artistique, Ben, Maciunas, Erébo et Serge III jouent des pièces Fluxus, dont Paper Piece de Ben Patterson etDuo for Violin de La Monte Young.
Pour Ben, « tout est art » et il continue de faire vivre l’esprit Fluxus au travers de ses œuvres.
Ben – Parcours contemporain
Au travers d’une succession de thématiques, de ses Petites idées jusqu’aux Nouvelles écritures, en passant par les Miroirs, la Photographie, le Temps ou la Mort, Ben propose une lecture contemporaine de son œuvre. Il poursuit son introspection dans un parcours à travers lequel le visiteur est invité à son tour à s’interroger sur sa condition, son temps, sa société. Chaque nouveau mot, chaque nouveau geste participe d’une quête de sens et de vérité.
La signature (1958 – 2019)
«Il n’y a pas d’art sans signature. On ne peut rentrer dans l’histoire de l’art sans signature et sans date. Lesœuvres dites collectives n’existent pas. Il y a toujours un détective pour chercher à savoir qui l’a faite etquand. Même pour les grottes de Lascaux on commence à traquer la personnalité de l’artiste et on cherche sa signature. Je me suis dit alors que si l’art n’était qu’une question de signature pourquoi ne pas faire un tableau avec juste ma signature ; exposé à partir de 1958, un peu partout.»
Les cageots (1960 – 2015)
«Il y a le grand art, qui est dans les musées et puis dans la rue, il y a le marché aux légumes. Et dans le marché aux légumes, il y a la vie de tous les jours et au musée, il y a l’artiste qui dit : “J’aimerais exposer lavie de tous les jours”. Alors j’ai écrit sur des cageots des phrases entendues au marché.
J’aime aussi le cageot parce que c’est un support gratuit que l’on trouve jeté par centaines au marché. C’est mon petit côté radin.»
Le temps (1961 – 2019)
«Certains pensent que l’argent est très important. D’autres que c’est la santé. Moi je pense comme John Cage l’a dit une fois : l’important c’est l’emploi du temps. Un milliardaire, le dictateur, le clochard emploient chacun le temps différemment, mais n’ont que 24 heures dans une journée. Et c’est l’usage qu’ils font de ces 24 heures qui est important. Le temps est un thème que j’ai commencé à travailler à partir de 1976, bien que j’aie signé le temps en 1960.»
Le collectionneur pauvre (1989 – 2015)
«J’ai insisté pour que cet espace existe parce que quand je vais chez l’Abbé Pierre et que je vois un tableau qui ressemble à du Gauguin, à du Picasso, à n’importe quel autre artiste, je le prends parce que ça colle à monhistoire de l’art parce que dans l’histoire de l’art, c’est le style qui compte et le style c’est la répétition.»
Portraits
«Je vois toujours deux têtes partout. Vous me montrez une casserole j’y vois une tête, deux chaussures parterre, je vois une tête, c’est même devenu un problème pour moi de ne pas les voir. Je me rappelle que mamère disait : “Le petit fait des portraits très ressemblants”. C’est pas vrai. Néanmoins, aujourd’hui je me senslibre de faire des têtes. Le jour du vernissage je réaliserai mon autoportrait à 19h30.»
Section cinéma
Caméra au poing Ben a constitué un fonds filmique considérable sur une période de soixante ans dans lequel apparaissent anonymes et artistes, dans des situations courantes telles qu’à la terrasse d’un café, lorsde vernissages ou de happenings.
Sont présentés ses premiers films archivant dès les années 60 ses actions de rue, ses films conceptuels etégalement ses dernières créations.
Le premier film : CANNES VILLE 1963
Pendant le Festival de Cannes en 1963, Ben pose desaffiches sur les murs de la ville :
Ben créateur de l’art total présente et signe, dans lecadre du Festival son film extraordinaire CANNESVILLE 1963.
Pour faire ce film, proposé à Georges Maciunas, Ben devait louer une salle de cinéma ; annoncer un filmd’avant garde ; il aurait installé ses caméras, trois si possible, cachées dernière l’écran ou sur les côtés, dansles rideaux. Ces caméras auraient filmé la salle vide, puis le public entrant s’assoir, le public s’impatientant de ne pas voir le film commencer, le public, furieux ou pas, demandant de se faire rembourser, quittant la salle peu à peu ; la dernière image du film et la première étant la salle vide.
LE NON FILM (2003)
Ce film expérimental traite de la recherche de la vérité, de la vie, de l’égo et en général de ce qu’est faireun film vrai. Il révèle le fonctionnement de sa réflexion dans la réalisation de son œuvre, l’ambiance et laprésence de son entourage en une succession de séquences drôles, sensibles, provocatrices et intimes.
Artistes invités
Comme il a toujours tenu à le faire, Ben invite des artistes, historiques ou émergents, reconnus localement ou internationalement, connaissances récentes ou amis de longue date, rencontrés au gré de ses activités. Il leur propose un espace dans la halle pour présenter leurs œuvres, projections, performances ou poésies.
Antaki, Arman, Hélios Azoulay, Michel Batlle, Ruy Blas, Robert Bozzi, BP, Jean-Pierre Bruno, John Cage, Denis Castagnou, Denis Castellas, Jacques Charlier, Giuseppe Chiari, Albert Chubac, Philip Corner,Béatrice Cussol, Daniel Daligand, Raymond Denis, Charles Dreyfus, Marcel Duchamp, Joël Ducorroy, Robert Erébo, Robert Filliou, Gregory Forstner, Joëlle Gainon, Alexandra Guillot, François Guinochet, Jacques Halbert, Max Horde, Isidore Isou, Pascal Josse, Konny, Maurice Lemaître, Jacques Lizène, Serge Maccaferri, Jonier Marin, MissTic, Olivier Mosset, Bernard Pagès, Francois Paris, Philippe Parreno, Bruno Pélassy, Présence Panchounette, Philippe Perrin, Jacques Pineau, Nicolas Privé, Maxime Puglisi, Jonhson Ray, Robert Roux, Serge III, Bernard Taride, Cédric Teisseire, Bernard Venet, Jean-Luc Verna, Ultra Violet ….
Ben a toujours favorisé les rencontres, les confrontations, les débats et la création. À partir de 1965, dans la mezzanine de son magasin, la galerie Ben doute de tout, il expose tous les artistes qui l’intéressent : Boltanski, Sarkis, La Monte Young, Alocco, Venet … En 1972, il ouvre La fenêtre, où il présente l’avant- garde niçoise. En 1975, il organise chez lui à Saint-Pancrace les Pour ou contre, au cours desquels il anime des débats et expose notamment Supports/Surfaces, Figuration Libre, Fluxus, Arman, Daniel Spoerri, Gilli et Serge III. En 1999, il ouvre consécutivement à Nice le Centre du Monde, rue du Lycée, suivi en 2011 parl’Espace à débattre, rue Vernier, et en 2017 Le César, dans le Vieux-Nice.
Il est aussi à l’origine de grandes expositions collectives. En 1977, À propos de Nice représente l’ensemble de la nouvelle création artistique niçoise pour l’ouverture du Centre Georges-Pompidou à Paris. En 1983, il organise une exposition de la jeune création du sud sur les quais de l’ancienne Gare des Chemins de fer de Provence, Un artiste peut en cacher un autre. En 2003, Fluxus Nice rassemble le mouvement Fluxus international et français dans différents lieux avec du théâtre, des expositions, performances, conférences et concerts. Il récidive en 2006 avec Le tas d’esprits à Paris, rue de Seine. En 2016, c’est le Palais idéal du Facteur Cheval à Hauterives qui reçoit ses invités.
Section débats
En 1958, un jour, sur la Promenade des Anglais à Nice, Ben rencontre François Fontan. Aimant tous deux la discussion et les débats, ils se retrouvent tous les soirs pour discuter vie, sexe, peuples, politique internationale, cultures, langues, ethnies. Tous sont bienvenus pour participer aux discussions. On parle desidées de Wilhelm Reich, de Marx, de Freud, etc. La position de François Fontan : l’avenir politique du monden’est pas dans l’uniformité mais dans la diversité.
En 1974, s’animent à l’occasion des Pour ou contre les premiers débats à Saint-Pancrace, sur la pelousechez Malabar et Cunégonde. Il y a un micro, une grande table, un buffet et on discute jusqu’à tard dans lanuit. Certains viennent pour la prise de parole, d’autres pour les merguez. Parmi ces Pour ou contre, on sesouvient du Tas d’Arman, de la discussion avec Combas et Di Rosa, de l’exposition d’Olivier Mosset et son arrivée bruyante avec 80 motards de la Bastille et des prises de bec entre Martine Doytier et Noël Dolla.Cultivant cette tradition, Ben aménage dans la grande Halle du 109, un espace avec plusieurs canapés, des tapis au sol, une table pour poser des verres, un grand tableau blanc avec des feutres, un micro, de la musique, des livres et quand il sera là, il lancera un débat et invitera le public à participer.
Section performances
À l’occasion de cette exposition, Ben installe un ring de boxe, comme il l’avait fait en 1972 lors de sonexposition à la Documenta 5 à Kassel en Allemagne. C’est sur ce ring que Joseph Beuys, dans le cadre d’uneAction d’adieu, avait alors participé à un combat de boxe avec l’étudiant en art Abraham David Christian. En 2012, pour les 50 ans du mouvement Fluxus, Eric Mangion, directeur du centre d’art de la Villa Arson, invite Ben qui renouvelle l’installation, et organise des performances sur ce ring pour l’exposition Ben signe Nice. Les artistes se succèdent en rounds de 3 minutes 33 secondes, temps imposé pour exécuter leurperformance. S’y succèdent joyeusement de la danse, de l’expression corporelle, de la musique, du théâtre, des défilés et bien sûr des pièces Fluxus. Chaque action, réalisée en public, est filmée puis transmise endifféré sur un écran placé au centre de l’installation. Les performances ont eu lieu durant plusieurs semaines, chaque mercredi, à 18 heures 33. Ben se présente en chef d’orchestre et arbitre, retrouvant ainsi les bases du mouvement Fluxus.
En 2013, avec la ville de Blois, Ben ouvre la Fondation du Doute. Le ring devient un espace pour le Combatd’idées, pour l’exposition inaugurale de ce nouveau centre d’art qui présente une collection de plus de 300 œuvres Fluxus.
Ce ring revient dans la grande Halle, au cœur de l’espace, autour d’un programme de performances, plaçant ainsi l’expression et les idées au centre de la vie de l’exposition, dans la tradition de Fluxus qui clame que l’art c’est la vie.
Les éditions In Fine publient, dans le cadre de « Nice 2019, L’Odyssée du cinéma », le catalogue de l’exposition de Ben au 109 « La vie est un film » (15 juin – 19 octobre). L’ouvrage sera signé par l’artiste et ses invités à l’occasion du finissage de cette exposition qui a réuni plus de 500 œuvres de Ben ainsi que celles de ses 64 invités (poésie, peinture, dessin, installation, vidéo, performance, sculpture, graffiti, etc.) et foulée par plus de 10 000 visiteurs.Construit selon les sections établies par Ben dans son exposition, le catalogue offre une lecture rétrospective de l’œuvre de l’artiste présentant successivement son parcours historique et contemporain ainsi que sa collection dont 92 œuvres ont été présentées pour l’occasion. Une double page est également consacrée à chacun des artistes, comprenant leurs réponses aux questions posées par leur hôte (Quelles sont les limites de l’art ?, Quelles sont les limites de la vérité ?, Quelles sont les limites du cinéma ?) ainsi qu’une vue de leur œuvre in situ.À 18h33, la signature du catalogue, en présence des artistes, marquera un nouvel acte de « La vie est un film » à l’issue duquel le ring de Ben sera la scène de concerts de musique Nissarte et Occitane. L’exposition fermera définitivement ses portes à 22h.L’Entre-Pont, fédération d’une trentaine de compagnies de spectacle vivant, lancera sa saison 2019/2020 avec la compagnie Gorgomar qui se produira à 21h avec « Le Grand Orchestre de Poche ». La soirée se poursuivra à 22h par un set électro-occitan de Dimitri from Panisse, jusqu’à minuit.
Exhibition “Life is a movie” Ben and his guests at 109
Exhibition from June 15 to October 19, 2019
The 109
89 route de Turin 06300 Nice
Mail le109@nice.fr
Website le109.nice.fr
Facebook le109nice
Contact expo 07 66 38 02 02
Opening hours
Tuesday to Saturday from 1 to 7 pm
Free entrance
Access to 109
Bus: Lines 4, 6, 16 and 89
Tramway : Vauban stop then bus 6 stop Abattoirs or 10mn walk Train : Riquier and Pont Michel stations
Vélo Bleu : Route de Turin station and Boulevard Vérany station
Free parking
Press release
To celebrate the centenary of the Victorine studios, the city of Nice is planning Nice 2019, the odyssey of cinema, a whole year of exhibitions and events to promote the history of cinema and current film production in Nice. The 109, on the site of the former slaughterhouses, route de Turin, is a place of extraordinary dimensions converted by the municipality into a center for contemporary creation.
Within this artistic breeding ground, the City of Nice and the artists’ collective La Station, with the support of Éva Vau- tier, invite Ben Vautier for a large summer exhibition entitled: Life is a film. More than 500 of Ben’s works, retracing 50 years of creation, will be installed in the large hall of more than 2,000 square meters, which he has chosen to share with guests, artists, long-time friends and young creators. This space in perpetual motion will host filmed productions, events, performances and debates, so dear to the artist.
A major artistic figure of the second half of the 20th century, Ben is known for his actions and paintings. His production, both philosophical and impertinent reflection on art, integrates our daily life in what it has of more particular. Ethnism, ego and truth are also important issues in his work.
Ben’s story and his art are deeply rooted in Nice. He was fourteen years old when he moved to Nice with his mother. Ten years later, at the end of the 1950s, he opened a second-hand record store at 32 rue Tonduti de L’Escarène. He quickly transformed the façade by accumulating a quantity of objects. Ben’s store was born. This place of meetings and exhibitions became the meeting place for the main artists of the Nice School: Ben was convinced that “art must be new and bring a shock”. In 1963, he invited George Macunias to Nice for the first World Festival of Fluxus and Total Art in France. Historical actor of this movement, on this occasion, Ben signs Nice “open work of art” on the Mount Alban.
When the Magasin de Ben became part of the Permanent Collection of the Centre Georges-Pompidou in 1975, he transferred his activities to his home on the hill of Saint-Pancrace. Ben continues to organize exhibitions with Supports/Surfaces, the Figuration Libre and launches the first Pour ou contre debates.
Very involved in the contemporary scene, Ben has always supported young artists, encouraged encounters, and given his point of view on current events, initially through leaflets, posters and newspapers, and now through regular and rich newsletters.
The event Nice 2019: A Cinema Odyssey, also resonates as a call to Ben’s important iconographic pro-duction. With a camera in his hand for 60 years, he has built up a considerable film collection, following the evolution of techniques, their supports and their uses. At the terraces of cafés or during artistic events, he captures moments, calls on many anonymous people and artists that he summons on the spot.
Several events will be organized during the exhibition with outdoor cinema screenings, performances, workshops and concerts. The evening of the opening will be the highlight of the exhibition and the launch of season 3 of Public Lighting, a weekend of creative and convivial events that will bring together all the artistic and cultural actors based at 109. The concerts that will follow the opening, on Friday June 14, will bring together artists from Nice and Occitane, Nux Vomica and Mossu T & Papet J (Massilia Sound System), living and festive witnesses of regional cultures, another fundamental subject in Ben’s reflection. Placed at the center of an ambitious and panoramic retrospective on creation in Nice, it is a Ben free as he has always been, and full of ideas that will make his total cinema.
I sign Nice, 1963, Mont Alban © Ben Vautier
Exhibition
Ben – Historical journey
The exhibition opens with a historical section presenting a selection of key works by Ben from 1958 to 1978. These testimonies trace the quest for a personal formal language that leads to the first writings. Initially simple signage, the posters produced in his store launch calls for meetings, encounters and exchanges. Backbone of the artistic community in Nice, the Magasin de Ben becomes the source of experimentation, gestures and actions, as well as the Promenade des Anglais, the street and the bistros. He thus begins street actions, in the line of the Fluxus movement, which he imports in France and of which he becomes one of the great protagonists.
At the end of the 1950s, Ben signed everything, appropriating the world as a whole through his images and actions. To illustrate these years, documents of the time are presented: posters, photographic archives and videos.
Research of forms / bananas and first writings (1955-1967)
When Ben began his artistic career in the mid-1950s, he experimented with all kinds of theories and practices with the primary goal of finding a personal formal language, of inventing something new, beyond the existing repertoire. As early as 1955, he retained the form, both abstract and phallic, of the banana, which he immediately declared to be his personal creation, and produced a whole series of drawings, on different supports, in Indian ink on paper.
From 1958 on, Ben discovered the potential of writing. Initially in his used record store, these are both information for visitors and advertising writings, such as “Le Bon Lait”, or even brands, such as Coca-Cola. The information panels are then made of wood and written with oil paint. Later, he developed his own technique, writing directly on the canvas, with a pipette filled with acrylic paint, tracing a new distinctive calligraphy. The signified takes over the signifier.
Laboratory 32 Ben’s store, 1959-1973, Nice © Ben Vautier
The Store (1958-1973)
Le Magasin, a work by Ben currently housed at the Centre Georges-Pompidou, reflects the vitality of the record store, which also served as a meeting point for the Nice art scene, a gallery, an exhibition space and a venue for all types of performances.
In the 1950s, Ben’s store was not only the liveliest art space in the city but also the gallery with the widest range of artistic expression. Ben’s programming is open to novelties and experimentations, anchored on a regional network of artists. Ben’s store is one of the places carrying the School of Nice and from 1963, the starting point of many Fluxus actions, of which it becomes the headquarters.
Already at this time, Ben was interested in the theory of ethnism of François Fontan, of whom he would become one of the most fervent disciples. Once again, the Magasin is the place to be for the movement committed to linguistic and cultural minorities – an issue that, for Ben, has lost none of its relevance.
Fluxus
In 1962 in London, during the Festival of Misfits, Ben met Georges Maciunas, founder and central figure of Fluxus. More than a movement, Fluxus is a state of mind, a space of sharing, of friendship, in which dozens of artists of all nationalities will recognize themselves. They propose an experimental total art that brings together multiple artistic languages by their will to abolish the gap between art and life.
Invited to the Festival by Daniel Spoerri, Ben exhibits himself as a living sculpture for 15 days and nights in the window of Gallery One. The following year, as an extension of this collaboration, Ben organized in Nice the last stage of a European tour, a World Festival of Fluxus and Total Art. He then founded a group in Nice, the Théâtre d’Art Total, declaring that theater is not on stage, but in the street, in life.
The actions of this group take place on the Promenade des Anglais and a concert is organized in the lounge of the Hotel Scribe. At the Théâtre de l’Artistique, Ben, Maciunas, Erébo and Serge III perform Fluxus pieces, including Paper Piece by Ben Patterson and Duo for Violin by La Monte Young.
For Ben, “everything is art” and he continues to keep the Fluxus spirit alive through his work.
Street gestures and actions (1958-1972)
In 1973, more than sixty of these actions were represented and materialized in a series of descriptive tables, like data sheets from the archives. Representation of these gestures, in words and images, they repertory a posteriori the actions in a coherent whole dated from 1958 to 1972.
The meaning of the Gestures can be summed up in one: Look at me, that’s enough (1963-1965), as can be read on the placard with which Ben exposed himself on the Promenade des Anglais in Nice.
Look at me it’s enough, 1962 Promenade des Anglais Nice © Ben Vautier
Ben – Contemporary course
Through a succession of themes, from his Small Ideas to New Writing, passing through Mirrors, Photography, Time or Death, Ben proposes a contemporary reading of his work. He continues his introspection in a journey through which the visitor is invited in turn to question his condition, his time, his society. Each new word, each new gesture is part of a quest for meaning and truth.
The signature (1958 – 2019)
“There is no art without a signature. One cannot enter the history of art without a signature and a date. The so-called collective works do not exist. There is always a detective to find out who made it and when. Even in the case of the Lascaux caves, we start to track down the personality of the artist and we look for his signature. I said to myself then that if art was only a question of signature why not make a painting with just my signature; exhibited from 1958, a little bit everywhere.”
The crates (1960 – 2015)
“There is great art, which is in the museums and then on the street, there is the vegetable market. And in the vegetable market, there is the everyday life and in the museum, there is the artist who says: “I would like to exhibit the everyday life”. So I wrote on crates some sentences I heard at the market.
I also like the crate because it’s a free medium that you can find thrown away by the hundreds at the market. That’s my little cheap side.”
Time (1961 – 2019)
“Some people think money is very important. Others think it’s health. I think as John Cage once said: the important thing is the use of time. A billionaire, a dictator, a tramp all use time differently, but they only have 24 hours in a day. And it is the use they make of these 24 hours that is important. Time is a theme I started working on in 1976, although I signed Time in 1960.”
The poor collector (1989 – 2015)
“I insisted that this space exist because when I go to Abbé Pierre’s house and I see a painting that looks like Gauguin, Picasso, any other artist, I take it because it fits my art history because in art history, it’s style that counts and style is repetition.”
Portraits
“I always see two heads everywhere. You show me a pan and I see a head, two shoes on the floor, I see a head, it has even become a problem for me not to see them. I remember my mother saying: “The little one makes very similar portraits”. It’s not true. Nevertheless, today I feel free to make heads. On the day of the opening I will do my self-portrait at 7:30 pm.
exhibition view photo Benoit Barbagli
Cinema section
Camera in hand Ben has built up a considerable filmic collection over a period of sixty years in which anonymous people and artists appear in everyday situations such as on the terrace of a café, during openings or happenings.
His first films archiving his street actions from the 60s, his conceptual films and also his latest creations are presented.
The first film : CANNES VILLE 1963
During the Cannes Film Festival in 1963, Ben put up posters on the walls of the city:
Ben, creator of total art, presents and signs his extraordinary film CANNESVILLE 1963.
To make this film, proposed to George Maciunas, Ben would have to rent a cinema; he would have to announce an avant-garde film; he would have installed his cameras, three if possible, hidden behind the screen or on the sides, in the curtains. These cameras would have filmed the empty room, then the public entering to sit down, the public getting impatient not to see the film start, the public, furious or not, asking for their money back, leaving the room little by little; the last image of the film and the first being the empty room.
THE NON FILM (2003)
This experimental film deals with the search for truth, life, ego and in general with what it means to make a true film. He reveals the functioning of his reflection in the realization of his work, the atmosphere and the presence of his entourage in a succession of funny, sensitive, provocative and intimate sequences.
Guest artists
As he has always made a point of doing, Ben invites artists, historical or emerging, locally or internationally recognized, recent acquaintances or long-time friends, met along the way. It offers them a space in the hall to present their works, projections, performances or poems.
Antaki, Arman, Helios Azoulay, Michel Batlle, Ruy Blas, Robert Bozzi, BP, Jean-Pierre Bruno, John Cage, Denis Castagnou, Denis Castellas, Jacques Charlier, Giuseppe Chiari, Albert Chubac, Philip Corner,Béatrice Cussol, Daniel Daligand, Raymond Denis, Charles Dreyfus, Marcel Duchamp, Joël Ducorroy, Robert Erébo, Robert Filliou, Gregory Forstner, Joëlle Gainon, Alexandra Guillot, François Guinochet, Jacques Halbert, Max Horde, Isidore Isou, Pascal Josse, Konny, Maurice Lemaître, Jacques Lizène, Serge Maccaferri, Jonier Marin, MissTic, Olivier Mosset, Bernard Pagès, Francois Paris, Philippe Parreno, Bruno Pelassy, Presence Panchounette, Philippe Perrin, Jacques Pineau, Nicolas Private, Maxime Puglisi, Johnson Ray, Robert Roux, Serge III, Bernard Taride, Cédric Teisseire, Bernard Venet, Jean-Luc Verna, Ultra Violet….
Ben has always favored meetings, confrontations, debates and creation. From 1965, in the mezzanine of his store, the Ben gallery doubts everything, he exhibits all the artists who interest him: Boltanski, Sarkis, La Monte Young, Alocco, Venet … In 1972, he opened La fenêtre, where he presented the avant-garde of Nice. In 1975, he organizes at his home in Saint-Pancrace the Pour ou contre, during which he animates debates and exhibits in particular Supports/Surfaces, Figuration Libre, Fluxus, Arman, Daniel Spoerri, Gilli and Serge III. In 1999, he opened consecutively in Nice the Centre du Monde, rue du Lycée, followed in 2011 by the Espace à débattre, rue Vernier, and in 2017 Le César, in Old Nice.
He is also at the origin of large group exhibitions. In 1977, À propos de Nice represents the whole of the new artistic creation of Nice for the opening of the Centre Georges-Pompidou in Paris. In 1983, he organized an exhibition of the young creation of the south on the quays of the former railway station of Provence, One artist can hide another. In 2003, Fluxus Nice brings together the international and French Fluxus movement in different places with theater, exhibitions, performances, conferences and concerts. He did it again in 2006 with Le tas d’esprits in Paris, rue de Seine. In 2016, it is the ideal Palace of the Facteur Cheval in Hauterives which receives its guests.
“Le Tas d’esprits”, 2006 Paris
Debate section
In 1958, one day, on the Promenade des Anglais in Nice, Ben met François Fontan. Both of them love discussion and debates and meet every night to discuss life, sex, people, international politics, cultures, languages, ethnicities. All are welcome to participate in the discussions. We speak of the ideas of Wilhelm Reich, Marx, Freud, etc. François Fontan’s position: the political future of the world is not in uniformity but in diversity.
In 1974, the first debates in Saint-Pancrace, on the pelouse of Malabar and Cunégonde, were animated during the For or Against. There is a microphone, a big table, a buffet and we discuss until late at night. Some come for the speech, others for the merguez. Among these pros and cons, we remember Arman’s Tas, the discussion with Combas and Di Rosa, Olivier Mosset’s exhibition and his noisy arrival with 80 bikers from the Bastille and the spat between Martine Doytier and Noël Dolla.Cultivating this tradition, Ben is setting up a space in the big hall of the 109, with several sofas, carpets on the floor, a table to put glasses on, a big white board with markers, a microphone, music, books and when he is there, he will launch a debate and invite the public to participate.
Performance section
The Ring, 2012, Exhibition Ben signs Nice, Centre d’Art de la Villa Arson, Nice
For this exhibition, Ben installs a boxing ring, as he did in 1972 during his exhibition at Documenta 5 in Kassel, Germany. It was in this ring that Joseph Beuys, as part of a farewell action, participated in a boxing match with the art student Abraham David Christian. In 2012, for the 50th anniversary of the Fluxus movement, Eric Mangion, director of the Villa Arson art center, invited Ben to renew the installation and organize performances on this ring for the exhibition Ben signs Nice. The artists follow each other in rounds of 3 minutes 33 seconds, the time imposed to execute their performance. Dance, body expression, music, theater, parades and of course Fluxus pieces follow one another joyfully. Each action, performed in public, is filmed and then broadcast on a screen placed in the center of the installation. The performances took place over several weeks, every Wednesday at 6:33 pm. Ben presents himself as conductor and referee, thus rediscovering the basics of the Fluxus movement.
In 2013, with the city of Blois, Ben opened the Fondation du Doute. The ring becomes a space for the Combatd’idées, for the inaugural exhibition of this new art center which presents a collection of more than 300 Fluxus works.
This ring returns to the Great Hall, in the heart of the space, around a program of performances, thus placing expression and ideas at the center of the life of the exhibition, in the tradition of Fluxus which proclaims that art is life.
Biography
Ben is one of the major artists of the 20th century known for his actions and paintings. His production, at the same time reflection on art in what it has of more fundamental and integrating our daily life in what it has of more particular, succeeds in making of the life an art. In this way, universes as distant from the artistic field as ethnism, ego or truth have entered his work. Ben enjoys an incredible popularity thanks to his writings, which combine the greatest impertinence and the greatest accuracy.
Ben, whose real name is Benjamin Vautier, is a French artist of Swiss origin. Born on July 18, 1935 in Naples, of an Irish and Occitan mother and a French-speaking Swiss father, he is the grandson of Marc Louis BenjaminVautier, a Swiss painter of the 19th century. He lived his first five years in Naples. After the declaration of war in 1939, Ben and his mother travelled extensively: Switzerland, Turkey, Egypt, Italy, and finally settled in Nice in 1949. He studied at the Parc-Impérial school and at the Stanislas College boarding school. His mother finds him a job at the bookstore Le Nain Bleu as an errand boy, then buys him a bookstore.
At the end of the 1950s, he sold it to open a small store, transforming its facade by accumulating a lot of objects and in which he sold second-hand records. His store quickly became a place for meetings and exhibitions where the main members of what would become the Ecole de Nice met: César, Arman, Martial Raysse, etc. Close to Yves Klein and seduced by the New Realism, he is convinced that “art must be new and bring a shock”. At the beginning of the 1960s, the game of appropriations began. The rule established by Yves Klein was to appropriate and sign the world as a work of art without ever copying and always being the first. Duchamp had the rags, Christo the packaging, Arman the Accumulations, Klein the Monochrome, Ben is going to sign everything that wasn’t: the holes, the mysterious boxes, Nice, the kicks, God, the chickens, etc., linking art and life, explaining that everything is art and that everything is possible in art. Essentially, Ben is a conceptual artist, an artist of ideas. He is a provocateur, a scoffer, an iconoclast, he is unclassifiable.
Ben, I sign everything, 1970 Saint Pancrace, Nice
Jacques Strau
“Ben’s Gestures, which he began performing in the late 1950s, now have their place in the pantheon of performance art. His writings are radical, revolutionary works. His works on social attitudes and conditions reveal a great humanism. Ben has an inexhaustible energy, which produces a flow of information, opinions, books, essays and Internet documents. He is not the cliché artist locked in his ivory tower but rather a street artist.” Jon Hendricks, 2010.
Ben lives and works since 1975 on the heights of Saint-Pancrace, a hill in Nice. His work is represented in the world’s most important private and public collections, including the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the WalkerArt Center in Minneapolis, the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney, the Museum ModernerKunst Stiftung Ludwig in Vienna, the MUHKA in Antwerp, the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, the Museum of Solothurn, the Centre Georges Pompidou and the Musée National d’Art Moderne in Paris, as well as the Musée d’Art Moderne et d’Art Contemporain in Nice.
Ben, by Bernard Blistène
Director of the Musée national d’art moderne, Centre Georges-Pompidou
The era is amnesiac. It celebrates over and over again those who “perform”, a way of suggesting that they are bucking the system. No longer an exhibition without the presence of the body. No project without a multidisciplinary dimension. No longer a manifestation without reconciliation of opposites. Art is everywhere and each appointment is there to prove it.
The dissensus sinks into complacent representations. We stage the misfortunes of the world with the idea of being witnesses and accusers. The good conscience does its work and the trick is done.
Ben Vautier sees the world differently. Sixty years he has been calling us and sending us back to our vain vanities. For sixty years, he has been fencing and expressing himself, struggling and flaring up in a jumble mixing tragedy and farce, suffering and joy, pros and cons. Praise for the difficulty of being oneself, self-criticism of the ego, aphorisms of all kinds. Ben is there, between truth and lies, between impertinence and wisdom. Ben is a necessary artist.
From the end of the 1950s to today, Ben stages and stages himself in the heart of a world that he never stops saying scares and amuses him. Ben rants and raves. He writes and he apostrophizes. He gesticulates and talks loudly. He is a scholar and a popular person. Ben is without a doubt one of the most extraordinary human animals I have ever met.
From all this, from this daily fight against himself and the time that never ceases to pass, Ben makes a work like no other, a work recognizable among all. Familiar and inventive. A work that resembles him and in which everyone, one day in his life, has recognized himself and found himself. We all have something of Ben Vautier in us, so much Ben Vautier tells us something of ourselves, of our misery and our joys, of our fears and our vanities, of our desires and our failures. In short, Ben is the man in search of the truth, without doubt a moralist. Never a moralizer.
You have to look at Ben’s work again and again. It is necessary to follow the course and the metamorphoses. You have to see him trying to build his language. “I drew shapes that I threw away if I found their source of influence,” he wrote of his early work. It is necessary to hear it seek “a beginning of personality” when appears in 1957, the shape of the Banana. And then come the Lines, the Stains, the Object Sculptures, the Hanging Objects, the Vomit, the Unbalance, the Holes, the Living Sculptures, the Lack and the All… The Whole as the search for reality in its totality, the Whole so that nothing escapes him. Between color and mastery. No doubt a superb definition of creation.
Because Ben is a creator. The word seems to be overused and suits him well. A creator who exposes, signs and sells God, his rival, at any price. A creator who runs and does justice to the Wasteland. A creator who gives form to words and invents, as his friend Jon Hendricks says on the occasion of Ben’s full striptease, a word painting. And then, there are the Gestures which, beyond the Actions – or “Aktion”, if you want to make Germanic and learned – beyond the “Performances” and other “Happenings”, of George Brecht’s “Events” with which they maintain a tender affinity, are the very expression of the life in all its states, of the body in all its manifestations: “Bumping my head against a wall”, “Spitting”, “Shining other people’s shoes”, “Digging a hole and selling dirt”, “Urinating”, “Going into the eautout dressed with an umbrella”, “Painting myself”, “Beating myself”… And so on and so forth. To say everything, to do everything, never to stop, never to rest. The body, his body, mine, yours in all its states to never stop fighting against the inevitable. Well, never offside. Ben, “our contemporary”, in the absolute urgency to be and to leave traces. To never disappear.
Bernard Blistène, 2018
The 109
Pole of contemporary cultures
In 2008, the city of Nice launched a project to convert the 18,000 m2 of its former slaughterhouses into a center for contemporary culture, contributing to the city’s cultural influence. Responding to a real need for a tool for research and creation, this mutation began with the installation in part of the site of an artists’ collective – La Station, an association defending contemporary art through production and exhibition.
At the same time, the city has set up a reflection mission called Chantier Sang Neuf, in order to broaden this process of mutation to the whole site and to all artistic expressions; reflection concretized by the creation of the Grande Halle (a space of 2000 m2), of Frigo 16, of the Table Ronde; all these spaces being able to receive various programs around the current music, exhibitions, conferences and debates. This experimental form of the project took place until 2015 through various actions of productions, residences (with notably La Compagnie Antipodes) and contemporary events.
Since 2016, after significant work to transform its premises, the 109 is beginning a new life allowing the reception of other major actors of the cultural life of Nice. The project is entering a second phase of consolidation of its objectives with the installation of 29 municipal plastic artists’ workshops; the Forum d’Urbanisme et d’Architecture; l’Entre-Pont, a federation of some 30 associations of live performances; the dance company Antipodes; Botox(s), the Alpeset Riviera contemporary art network; and SACA, the Architects’ Union of the French Riviera. With the energy generated by its multiple events, the 109 tends to consolidate its role as a genuine breeding ground for creation.
In its new configuration, Le 109 is positioned as an essential interface for contemporary creation in the local, national and international cultural landscape by coordinating the actions of the site’s protagonists and, above all, by its rich, diverse and ambitious programming, which focuses on different types of cultural, artistic and societal issues of our time.
le109.nice.fr www.facebook.com/le109nice/
The 109 © Cédric Teisseire
The Station
The Station’s main objective is to support and disseminate contemporary cultural and artistic life in Nice by all means and in all forms that it takes.
Founded in Nice in 1996, the Starter association is piloting the La Station project. The particularity of this association is to make cohabit – at its origin in a former gas station in the city center – exhibition spaces open to the public and production workshops.
The Station participates in this phenomenon, which appeared in Europe in the 90’s as an alternative in the diffusion and production of art, through the emergence of self-managed artist centers called ArtistRun Spaces.
The Station’s vocation is to highlight the artistic production that takes place in this city, and to attract from elsewhere, from France and Europe, very contemporary practices of art. Its purpose is to help artists and participate in the development, promotion and dissemination of their activities.
It is in a will to propose an additional link between artists, institutions, art centers, galleries and the public, that La Station finds its relevance, by trying to bring an added value to an existing cultural panorama.
In October 2009, La Station moved into the South Hall of the former cold storage facilities made available by the City of Nice, now called Le 109. These renovated premises have a surface area of 1,000 m2 and are divided into exhibition spaces open to the public and workshops. A dozen artists work there and participate in the life, organization and maintenance of such an enterprise, by pooling their skills.
Exhibitions, performances are offered to the public, as well as some more particular events: readings, listening sessions, concerts, video projections, conferences…
In addition to its in-house programming, La Station has acquired over the years a national and European audience through exhibitions organized in various cities abroad.
www.lastation.org www.facebook.com/lastationstarter/
