Robert Kusmirowski's "Stronghold" at the Biennale in Lyon
Polish artist Robert Kusmirowski chose the venue La Sucrière (the Sugar factory) to host his spectacular installation for the 11th Biennale in Lyon, France
Kusmirowski's massive new installation follows the artist's interest in the weight of memory, both collective and individual. Hosted at La Sucrière, one of the four main venues of this year's Biennale, "Stronghold" is yet another statement about the necessity of having an ambiguous and critical approach towards history. The respect tinged with mistrust which the artist feels for history leads to the creation of a solemn, critical space for discussion. Thus, Kurmikowski explicitly places the visitor into a two-phased appreciation of his piece, expressed through its structure and timing: first, one is struck by the immensity of this inaccessible circular structure and its meticulous sombre architecture, before witnessing a monumental scenario staged by the artist himself.
Inspired by Samuel Beckett's "Endgame", Kusmikowski's project withdraws the essence of both figurative art and theatre to implicate the viewer within his personal study. Accordingly, the visitor is first confronted with the immensity of this inaccessible inert vestige of a library, and its resulting contemplation, maybe questioning. Later, this frozen passive space suddenly becomes the stage of some strange performance, getting a newfound legitimacy that might embody the answers to some of the inquiring it first inspired.
Robert Kuśmirowski is often labelled as a "genius of fake", and an "ingenious imitator". For "Stronghold", the artist once again shines by his undisputable consistency and technique, by creating a strikingly precise and meticulous reproduction of an equally indefinable library-like space. As usual, the anonymous yet familiar objects do not have a specific prototype, but only evoke the material culture of the past, an impressive accumulation best defined by defined by Joanna Mytkowska as "baroque of excess and entropy of detail".
The title of the 11th Biennale de Lyon, "A Terrible Beauty Is Born", is a verse from the poem "Easter, 1916" written by W.B. Yeats on September of that year, on the uprising by which hundreds of Irish rebels claimed emancipation from the British. At first sight, the poem could be read as celebrating the martyrs that gave their life for the cause of independence. Yet upon further scrutiny, the oxymoron indicates that the attitude of the speaker is one of perplexity and doubt. The poem shifts uneasily between affirmation, question and negation. It is, fundamentally, at war with itself.
As such, the title of the event appears more as a methodological tool than strictly a theme. It enables the project to explore the force of paradox and contradiction, tension and ambivalence, and to address the state of urgency in the world and in the arts today. Alongside Kusmirowski's piece, all participating artists showcase their interpretation of negation, contradiction and doubt of artistic expression. Articulated through a series of journeys or narratives, the exhibition intends to address the density of the present as well as the power of the imaginary, the visionary and the hallucinatory.
Conceived by Argentinean curator Victoria Noorthoorn, the 11th edition of the Biennale de Lyon is gathering 70 international artists, mostly from Europe, Africa and Latin America. Their work is exhibited across four main venues: La Sucrière, the Bullukian Foundation, the Museum of contemporary art of Lyon, and the TASE factory. The international exhibition is accompanied by two platforms: "Veduta" and "Résonance".
The event is supported by the Polish Institute in Paris.
The 11th edition of the Biennale de Lyon runs through the 15th of September till the 31st of December 2011.
La Sucrière
Les Docks
47/49 quai Rambaud
69002 Lyon
tel. 04 72 41 19 00
For more information on the Biennale de Lyon see: www.biennaledelyon.com