THE INFINITE WOMAN
Villa Carmignac, Porquerolles Island
April 27, 2024 - November 3, 2024
The Fondation Carmignac is presenting The lnfinite Woman exhibition at Villa Carmignac, on the island of Porquerolles off the coast of Hyères (Var), curated by Alona Pardo.
Strong, lustful, fatal, loving, demonic, tempting or mythical, women have been represented in many ways over the centuries, often in response to a patriarchal vision of the world. Exploring identity, sexuality, pleasure and power, The lnfinite Woman sheds light on the ways in which women have been viewed from the earliest myths to the most contemporary and subversive representations. Here, art liberates women's bodies from Western beauty canons, offering reinvented models that challenge not only social norms, but also the limits of art itself as well as its oppressive categories.
Organised thematically, the exhibition draws on ideas of myths and monsters in the representation of women to reflect on womanhood in all its many guises. Moving surefootedly between images of goddesses to scrutinizing the idea of the femme fatale, from disruptive ideas of motherhood to paying homage to the power of women’s desire, from beguiling fairytale creatures to cyborgs highlighting their emancipatory potential, to elevating (dis) obedient bodies that upend Western conventions of beauty while reflecting on the body as vessel, the exhibition closes with a section devoted to sirens and anti-icons to explore how gender is shape shifting in the 21st century. Ultimately, the works in the exhibition disrupt conventional ideas of womanhood to reflect on feminine power and how the representation of women has shaped global cultural attitudes.
Visitors to the exhibition are invited to take a thematic tour of over eighty works, and to encounter female figures that are as familiar as they are unsettling: sacred and nurturing women (Sandro Botticelli, Mary Beth Edelson, Loie Hollowell), free-spirited sirens (Kiki Smith, Chris Ofili, Sofia Mitsola), spider-women (Louise Bourgeois, Frida Orupabo), enhanced cyborgs (Lee Bul, Vivian Greven, Tishan Hsu), and objects of desire (Roy Lichtenstein, Pablo Picasso, Thomas Ruff).
Bringing together over sixty artists from different historical periods, geopolitical spaces and aesthetic currents - and with plural gender identities, the exhibition offers a dialogue between contemporaries such as Wangechi Mutu, Lisa Yuskavage and Michael Armitage and major historical artists including Louise Bourgeois, Egon Schiele and Judy Chicago. Using techniques as varied as painting, drawing, photography, video, collage, sculpture, ceramics and textiles, the artists conjure up new fantasies and give life to new female narratives, imbued with power (ORLAN, Martine Guttierez, Zanele Muholi) and pleasure (Laure Provost, Betty Tompkins, Dorothy Iannone, John Currin).
Just as a stay on an island can transform our relationship with the world and with reality, The Infinite Woman exhibition at Villa Carmignac offers an artistic and interpersonal journey, an invitation to redefine norms and areas of expression, all conceived as a poetic and uninhibited celebration of the elusive multiplicity of the feminine.
THE ARTISTS
ALDRIDGE Miles
AMER Ghada
ANGER Kenneth
ARMITAGE Michael
BALL Sarah
BENGOLEA Cecilia
BLANC Mireille
BOTTICELLI Sandro
BOURGEOIS Louise
BREITZ Candice
CHICAGO Judy
CURRIN John
CURTISS Julie
DE KOONING Willem
DUMAS Marlène
EBINAMA Chioma
EDELSON Mary Beth
EMIN Tracey
GANESH Chitra
GLYNN Nash
GREVEN Vivian
GUTIERREZ Martine
HENROT Camille
HOLLOWELL Loie
HSU Tishan
HUJAR Peter
IANNONE Dorothy
KAHRAMAN Hayv
KEOGH Caitlin
KOGELNIK Kiki
KRISTALOVA Klara
LEE Bul
LEVINE Sherrie
LICHTENSTEIN Roy
McGURN France-Lise
MITSOLA Sofia
MUHOLI Zanele
MUTU Wangechi
OFILI Chris
ORLAN
ORUPABO Frida
OTHONIEL Jean-Michel
PERACH Anna
PICASSO Pablo
PIERRE Naudline
PRINCE Richard
PROUDFOOT Paloma
PROUVOST Laure
QUARLES Christina
RUFF Thomas
SAVILLE Jenny
SCHIELE Egon
SELF Tschabalala
SIKANDER Shahzia
SIN WAI KIN
SINGER Avery
SMITH Kiki
STOLLER Jessica
SZAPOCZNIKOW Alina
TOMPKINS Betty
TROCKEL Rosemarie
URSUTA Andra
VERBOOM Marion
XIA Shafei
YUSKAVAGE Lisa
ZANGEWA Billie
Villa Carmignac
Porquerolles Island, Var, France
Opening from 27 April to 3 November
>> TICKET
OPENING HOURS
Tuesday to Sunday. Closed every Monday.
APRIL - MAY - JUNE
10am to 6pm (last admission 4pm to 4.30pm)
JULY - AUGUST
10am to 7pm (last admission 5pm to 5.30pm)
Late opening every Thursdays until 10pm (last admission 8pm to 8.30pm)
SEPTEMBER - OCTOBER - NOVEMBER
10am to 6pm (last admission 4pm to 4.30pm)
RATES SELF-GUIDDED VISIT*
Full rate €16
Reduced rate €11
Youth rate €6
Free: under 12yo, press card, residents of Porquerolles, ICOM card.
*Conditions on villacarmignac.com
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The Infinite Woman contains works of a sexual nature that may be disturbing for some viewers.