Breakthrough + “Re-” is an art project led by students of IESA’s MBA Contemporary Art in collaboration with Galerie Jérôme Poggi and its non-profit cooperative structure, Societes.
Thanks to the contribution and support of Galerie Jérôme Poggi and Societes, the students were put in touch with talented artists and invited them to their exhibition.
This project is divided into three events:
An online platform featuring interviews with art professionals and enthusiasts, in the form of a website.
Live talks on the IESA Paris campus.
An exhibition, Willful Blindness, in October 2020, which will also take place at IESA.
For this graduation project, the MBA Contemporary Art class looked at how we view our society, particularly in the field of artistic professions. When an individual has made a breakthrough and become aware of inequalities and imperfections, he or she should be invited into a state of “re”; this prefix symbolizes an improvement on a problem, an effort of awareness. Thus, we are called to reflect, to reconnect and to join one another.
About the online curatorial platform:
The COVID-19 pandemic inspired our team to create an online platform, giving everyone access to interviews with creatives and intellectuals from the art world and beyond. By creating a website, we want to reach more people and invite professionals from around the world to start a conversation about openness, intersectionality and the future of their professions. In addition to the end-of-year round tables, we will have an extremely varied selection of experiences and viewpoints. Our four platforms, Re-born, Re-interpret, Re-touch and Re-union, will each target specific topics such as inclusivity, communication or the conscious collecting of objects. The website will regularly publish news and information about the entire project, from June to October 2020. Its launch date has been set for June 26. Its goal is to reconnect individuals through interactive online activities to address physical disconnections.
Our first platform, Re-interpret, will aim to re-examine our relationships between creatives and intellectuals, with the various players in these creative industries, as well as our interactions with outsiders.
We wish to analyze in detail how we can bring more intersectionality and inclusion to every action we undertake. Whatever artistic project we undertake, we must reflect on who is included and therefore excluded.
One of the guiding threads of our project is to bring attention and compassion toward one another in creative fields. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, countless projects had to be abandoned and many could not be rescheduled. We want to give a voice to those whose ideas have been silenced. Through a series of interviews, with art market players but also with individuals from other creative fields, we will give them a space to relaunch their projects and give them the help they deserve. Our goal is for each guest to have the opportunity to present their project as they wish, to explain their objectives and what their ideal situation would have been. This topic will be addressed in the Re-born section.
An object could be bypassed; it could be collected; it could be a witness of time. The interactive Re-touch section will share passions about the act of collecting. Why do we give so much care and love to certain types of art objects? What is the intention behind the collection? How do we express our interest in a non-living object? Through them, we find our stories and our History. We therefore care for the non-human. Through interviews with collectors and a playful quiz, we aim to better understand the world of collecting.
We talk, we discuss, we debate: whatever its form, communication is essential to human beings. Over the coming months, we will invite two speakers to discuss with us the idea of caring for the audience. Exhibition curators will be able to share their experience of how they consider their audience while carrying out an exhibition. Gallery owners will be able to share their ways of approaching their collectors and artists. Artists and academics will explain the passion in their work, why it is so important to them and why it should be for us too. The Re-union section will address this topic.
The exhibition Willful Blindness will be presented at the IESA gallery from October 28, 2020 to November 4; further information will be published at the start of the school year.
About Galerie Jérôme Poggi: Galerie Jérôme Poggi is one of the leading galleries of the new Parisian generation, founded by the curator and art historian Jérôme Poggi in 2009. The gallery represents some twenty international artists from different generations.
About Societies: The non-profit organization Societies was founded in 2004 by Jérôme Poggi to experiment with new models of political economy for art, directed by Jérôme Poggi and Thomas Conchou, curator, and Jeanne Turpault, project officer. Societies encourages and supports private initiatives led by all communities of civil society wishing to intervene in the art scene.
About IESA Arts and Culture: The school’s mission is to train students for careers in the arts and cultural management, focusing on art markets, performing arts, communication and cultural industries. Its international department supervises students from around the world and offers immersive courses in English. Located in the heart of Paris, IESA offers professional meetings and visits to museums, galleries and cultural institutions as part of its hands-on approach.