The Flowers Of Evils Still Bloom/Spleen: Les Fleurs Du Mal

Opening Thursday November 6th, 2008. Reception from 6 to 8 pm

Since my school years when I studied symbolism with Mme Geneviève Lacambre (former curator at the Gustave Moreau Museum) at l’Ecole du Louvre, I have been passionate about this multiple-faceted artistic movement. For me, Symbolism opened Pandora’s box of forbidden images by revealing to my eyes reality in its gritty particularity and those representations hidden by the ideal and the moral.

During a casual conversation with my journalist friend Roxana Azimi last May, we mentioned the revival of the Symbolist movement within the works of the Surrealists as well as in many artists’ works of our contemporary era. This discussion developed into an intense exchange of ideas from which was born the exhibit concept for "Spleen: les Fleurs du Mal."

The idea is to transform the 4,000 ft of my gallery, located in the heart of the New York City Chelsea art district at 551 W 21st, into an apartment. Each room, the walls covered in black, gold, red, and purple textiles, will be inspired by a key character of the symbolist imaginary. The exhibition will begin with a dedication to Baudelaire, from whose poetry was derived the impetus for the Symbolist movement and the title for this show. This first room will be adorned in gold, representative of the luxury and sensuality that was essential in the mind of Baudelaire, as well as to Oedipus and to the Sphynx, messenger of intriguing questions. Beyond this room will be the dining room of Des Esseintes (the principal character of Joris-Karl Huysmans’ novel, À Rebours), the bedroom of Edgar Allan Poe, Freud’s psychoanalyst cabinet of Gradiva, and Dorian Gray’s library, as described in Oscar Wilde’s celebrated novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray. In each room, works by symbolist and contemporary artists will together weave a strange, mystical, and decadent message. To illustrate, the nineteenth century works of Odilon Redon’s Araignée (“Spider“) and Gustave Moreau’s Salome will interact with the contemporary canvases of Axel Pahlavi’s La Petite Mort and Damien Hirst’s Who is Afraid of the Dark? (fly painting). The final piece will be a recreation of “le repas noir” (the black meal) of Des Esseintes. Furniture and other decorative objects will also be included to reinforce the atmosphere of le fin de siècle.

The exhibition will take place 06 November 2008 through 10 January 2009. Please join me in this grand endeavor and illustrious collaboration with your support through suggestions and consignment of art works. I look forward to discovering your ideas.

THE FLOWERS OF EVILS STILL BLOOM
SPLEEN: LES FLEURS DU MAL

Künstler: Arman , Artists Anonymous , Matthew Barney, Jakob S. Boeskov, Camille Claudel, Hans Bellmer, Maurice Denis, James Ensor, Lin Esser, Damien Hirst, Fernand Khnopff, Gustav Klimt, Dawn Mellor, Pierre Molinier, Gustave Moreau, Adolphe Mossa, Axel Pahlavi, Bruno Perramant, Francis Picabia, Sabine Pigalle, Odilon Redon, Felicien Rops, Tanja Roscic, Loredana Sperini, Franz von Stuck, Vuk Vidor, Fritz Welch ...