FREE EXHIBITION 18.09.2020 / 3.10.2020

MARC MARTIN lAvAllée-bRuSSelS les tasses

PublIC TOIleTS, PRIvATe AFFAIRS After beRlIN and PARIS, « En milieu hostile à la diversité, les mœurs ‘‘contre-nature’’ devaient se vivre clandestinement. the exhibition will move Dans l’anonymat des pissotières, avec l’alibi du besoin naturel. Les pissotières, aussi sordides soient-elles en apparence, ont bel et bien permis à des générations de s’émanciper. Faute de to bRuSSelS LaVallée mieux, les gays vivaient là une liberté sexuelle qu’on ne leur accordait pas ailleurs. » from 18 September. Emanuele Peyret - Libération - « Petits coins, gros tabous »

« Marc Martin raconte une infime partie de l’Histoire qui a existé et que personne n’avait voulu explorer ni dévoiler jusque-là...» Nathalie Jérôme - Le Figaro - « L’Histoire secrète des vespasiennes... »

« Der französische Fotograf Marc Martin zeigt in seiner Ausstellung, was das Reizvolle an öffentlichen Toiletten als Sextreffpunkt ist...» Enrico Ippolito - Spiegel Kultur - « Pissbuden, "Klappen", "Büdchen"... »

« The primary function of the urinals, however, was soon subverted by other needs...» Digby Warde-Aldam - The Guardian - « How the urinals of Paris helped beat the Nazis »

« Le photographe Marc Martin s’intéresse aux sexualités en marge et aux interstices de la culture LGBT. Un ouvrage magnifique... » Patrick Thévenin - Les Inrockuptibles - « Un livre et une expo sur les pissotières »

« C'est... un objet impur, oublié des jeunes générations LGBT » Didier Roth Bettoni - Hétéroclite - « Piss and Love, un ouvrage consacré aux tasses »

« L’histoire particulière des pissotières... Une expo qui fait date » Hélène Molinari - Komitid - « Marc Martin redore le blason des pissotières... »

« Une esthétique à la Jean Genet... » Etienne Dumont - Bilan - « Les tasses de Marc Martin »

« Le photographe rappelle à notre mémoire les dessous oubliés des pissotières où des homosexuels, travestis et prostitués se sont retrouvés pendant plus d’un siècle... » Maïa Mazaurette - Le Monde - « Les toilettes, dernier lieu de l’intime » “Never in the history of sex was so much offered to so many by so few.” Quentin Crisp , “The Naked Civil Servant”, 1968.

« Anonymous », Collection Marc Martin. PUBLIC TOILETS, PRIVATE AFFAIRS

In the closet of History, cottages are filthy. In the slang of the last century, the cottage (la tasse in french), was the old public toilet. Installed in public spaces in a time when hygiene mattered, urinals were meant to meet the physiological needs of the male population. But secretly, cottages also addressed a social need. Men with “perverted morals" laid the cornerstones of cottage living.

Opened in 2018 at the Schwules Museum in Berlin, Marc Martin's exhibition creates a bridge between generations and invites contemporary art to enter a dialogue with the past: "Urinals have always had a bad reputation. They are more synonymous with shame than pride within the LGBTQI+ community. Those who cruised in there have often been accused of being cowardly, de - scribing their encounters in these public places as sordid. But didn't they, for over a century, dare to confront pleasures defended by the law? I wish these men could be credited with a certain courage. I would like to bring back to these places their troubling sensual past ".

Instead of political correctness, the artist Marc Martin favours human and social truth. He advocates the visibility of sexuality in all its diversity. The artist also reminds us that in some countries, even today, homosexuality is still forbidden. Cottages ( or tasses) , these anonymous places of passage, will carry on their role of clandestine hideout.

The exhibition "LES TASSES" will open to the public on 18th September, until 3rd October 2020 at LaVallée . The exhibition is organised by LaVallée-Smart in collaboration with the Schwules Museum Berlin and the RainbowHouse (as part of the PrideFestival Brussels ).

Anonymous. Collection Marc Martin. « Vestiges », Marc Martin 2017. “Urinals brought all manner of men in close proximity to each other in a way that would have been far less inconspicuous elsewhere: heterosexuals and homosexuals, masculine and effeminate, young and old, rich and poor...”

Wannes Dupont , « Het onbedwongen kwaad . Een genealogie van homoseksualiteit in België », 2015.

« Coup d’oeil, pour comparer ? », Marc Martin 2017. Prohibition to urinate in the streets under penalty of prosecution before the simple police court, 1846. Archives of the City of Brussels .

Arrest of the Manneken Pis of Brussels. Satirical poster mocking the 1846 ban on relieving oneself in the public. Archives of the City of Brussels. The vespasienne , and... public utilities Extract from the exhibition catalogue Marc Martin, Les tasses LaVallée-Brussels.

The public urinal was a huge step forward in public hy - of criticism. Photographs of Old Brussels in 1900 show giene The vespasienne – named after the Roman Em - many types of cast-iron or slate urinals, often built di - peror Vespasian, who once collected a tax on urine – rectly against the facades of buildings. Discreetly im - was developed in 1834 in Paris. Hence, the French capi - planted in dead ends and side streets, they offered little tal claimed to set standards in the field of public toilets, corners of (and occasions for) illicit pleasure. and the Belgium capital followed suit. Very early on, certain urinals in Brussels, known as cruis - At the beginning of the 19 th century, the sanitary facilities ing spots for the city’s homosexuals, were subject to po - in Brussels were still rudimentary. A large proportion of lice surveillance. As told by the historian Wannes Dupont the houses had no latrines. Where toilet facilities did in his study on homosexuality in Belgium, those located exist, there was often no maintenance . According to behind La Bourse (the Stock Exchange), were described Claire Billen and Jean-Michel Decroly, there were no pub - in a police report of 1895 as being frequented during lic latrines in Brussels at the time. During their peregrina - the day by stockbrokers and men of business, but after tions, the inhabitants relieved themselves as it suited midnight by men of the ‘business of the behind ’. 3 them: under the shelter of a tree, in dark corners or against discreet walls. Some of the alleys witnessing wild The more ingenious the architects became, the greater peeing were given nicknames by the citizens of Brussels: the chance the urinals would not be used exclusively Pisstrotje, Voeuil Strotje or Schaaitstrotje .1 for their intended purpose. Their protective sheet metal, which was supposed to hide the person urinating on the In 1845, a first series of rudimentary urinals had hardly inside from the view of passers-by, became increasingly been installed when the population was advised to re - imposing. It perpetuated the urinal’s location and rein - spect the 1836 ordinance, under penalty of prosecution: forced its shady role. The advertising model became em - It is prohibited to urinate in the streets! Cartoons of the blematic of the 1900s. Its “teapot” shape earned it its “arrest” of Manneken Pis immediately circulated in the first nickname, probably inspired by the activity of those press. Given the scarcity of Brussels’ first urinals, the who indulged in “ faire les tasses ” (literally “doing the male population continued to relieve itself wherever cups”). This three-stall vespasienne became the favourite they pleased. It took the famous Parisian pissoir columns among “cruisers” who, for mere “practical” reasons, pre - with illuminated advertising and two or three stalls to ferred to occupy the middle stall. change this attitude: 200 of these striking kiosks were erected on the most prominent sidewalks and on the main traffic arteries of Brussels. Twenty-two urinals were 1 & 2 / Claire Billen / Jean-Michel Decroly , « Petits coins dans la located close to City Hall, around St. Michael’s collegiate grande ville – les toilettes publiques de Bruxelles du moyen âge à Church (Saint-Michel) and on the sidewalks of Rue Royale nos jours », 2003. (TN: The nicknames mean “Piss, Dirt & Shit 2 and Rue de la Régence . These impressive urinals, in the Streets ” respectively.) 3/ Wannes Dupont, “ Het onbedwongen vicinity of public monuments, quickly became the subject kwaad. Een genealogie van homoseksualiteit in België” , 2015. « Anonymous », Collection Marc Martin. Anoniemen Marc Martin, 2007-2020. Set of amateur photographs. Personal collection (selection).

A certain degree of authenticity is what characterises amateur photography. This set of private images of vespasiennes forms an unusual body of work.

I found them online, at flea markets or at garage sales, over a period of ten years. None of them are sourced or dated. Their authors and the people represented are unknown. By assembling these photographs (often with serrated edges), I want to build a bridge between narrative and memory. Different in texture, size, provenance and time period, often blurry, full of scratches and of the passage of time (or in Proustian style: in “remembrance of things past”), they illustrate implicit otherness. They give identity clues and draw clandestine maps out in the public. Exposed on a straight line, these anonymous photographs – all surrounded by white passe-partouts and equidistant from each other – deconstruct the image of “urban phantoms”.

They read like a quest for one’s roots. Gender Trouble Extract from the exhibition catalogue Marc Martin, Les tasses LaVallée-Brussels.

Women probably never enjoyed the benefits of these amenities designed by men and for men exclusively. Yet, some of them had at a very early stage campaigned for gender equality in toilets, although their demands were never noted. In 19 th -century cities, taking a piss was first and foremost a man’s business – which takes us back to the outset of feminism and the question of gender. The pissoir , a patriarchal symbol as well as a symbol of the oppressed, sent the codes waltzing.

Why are these little monuments, designed to answer urgent calls of nature and lining our streets, reserved to men’s sole use? … Why are women, who are men’s equals before nature, not their equals at the eyes of the administration ?1

Early city planners seemed to think that these ladies would not urinate outside their homes, thus reducing their role to fleeting passers-by in the city. For reasons of safety and decorum, the few mixed structures where women could also give in to their pressing needs were fee-paying places, often kept within parks and depart - ment stores.

To ensure that their experience was as comfortable as possible, they could rely on toilet attendants looking after the facility (themselves managed by clever busi - nessmen), and ultimately replaced by coin-operated turnstiles. Now, we call them Sanisettes by JCDECAUX.

1/ L’Histoire , 08.02.1870. « Supplice de Tantale », 1900. Collection Marc Martin. Thank you, Sir! Marc Martin, Set of coloured photographs , 2018.

Between the steady flow of fluids on pale tiles one can hear the dry sound of coins being dropped reluctantly in a saucer. In a mixed fragrance of antiseptics, violet deodorant and ‘natural relief’, we find special women, mostly middle-aged... They listen to the crackle of their transistors; pile up their small change... They are poetically referred to as “dames pipi” [loo ladies].

Inspired by a chronicle in Libération on the activities of Parisian subterranean lavatories in the 1980s, my series imitates the genre of photo-novels. It stages a clandestine meeting under the eyes of a restroom attendant. A row of cubicles on the right and a general view of the urinals on the left. From her warden room, nothing escapes her. Occasionally a sort of connivance occurs between the immobile loo lady and the men who pass by. Does this alleged tolerance make the attendant an implicit madam ? Do the two men embody an intergenerational relationship or the ritual of “fee-based services”? No credits granted ...

[This photo series was produced in the Art Nouveau setting of the non-operational toilets of the métro station Palais-Royal in Paris, thanks to the generous support of the RATP’s Heritage and Culture Department, Paris.]

« D’antan », Marc Martin, 2018 . ABOUT MARC MARTIN

Marc Martin (1971) is a French photographer and videographer. Marc Martin, les tasses, lavallée-BrUssels 978-2-492311-00-0 He explores the visibility of sexual minorities and claims a freedom to ISBN : Editions AGUA (elagua.eu) express – explicit or not – a diversity of practices. By confronting the notions of beauty and repulsion, of good and bad taste, he readjusts the exhibition catalogue in 3 versions level of tolerance, including the LGBTQI* community. (Fr + Nl + eN) 68 pages. 170 x 235 mm

Recent shows

2015 Nicole Canet Galerie au Bonheur du Jour, « Dur Labeur » 2017 leslie lohman Museum, New York, « Forbidden » (Collectif) Marc Martin, les tasses - 2017 schwules Museum, Berlin, « Marc Martin, Public Toilets, Private Affairs » tOIlettes PUBlIQUes - aFFaIres PrIvées 2018 , , « The Eroticism of Things » (Collectif) Museum der Dinge Berlin ISBN : 978-2-9553078-6-1 2019 , , « Les Tasses, toilettes publiques, affaires privées » Point ephémère Paris Editions AGUA (elagua.eu)

(Fr) 300 pages. 230 x 290 mm

NOMINATION PRIX SADE 2020 (26 September) www.marcmartin.paris things_that_stink marc martin LAVALLÉE-BRUSSELS

RUE ADOLPHE LAVALLÉE 39, 1080 MOLENBEEK-SAINT-JEAN. BRUSSELS.

FRee eXHIbITION (FR. Nl. eN.) 18.09 / 3.10.2020 Open from 12.30 to 19.00. Night hours on Saturdays and Sundays. Closed on Mondays.

PRIVATE PREVIEW 17.09 / 17:00 - 22:00

OPeNING WeeK-eND 18-19-20.09.2020 KLIK HIER

Sanitary measures The health of visitors and the team is important to LaVallée-Smart and the Pride Festival. In order to guarantee a visit to the exhibition in the greatest safety, the sanitary measures in force will be carefully applied. "MARC MARTIN, LES TASSES" LaVallée

CONTACT BRUSSELS visit.brussels Rue Royale, 2, 1000 Brussels.

Frederick Boutry [email protected]

Noémie Wibail [email protected]

CONTACT PARIS

Agence Anonyme 45 avenue de la Motte-Picquet 75015 Paris

Emilie Melloni-Quemar [email protected]

Maud Moureau [email protected]

Download the exhibition brochures and copyright-free photos: CLICK HERE https://www.dropbox.com/sh/d4khzcuawczp34w/AACx6tM-jUms2e4aYzgM4FDua?dl=0

« Cabine avec vue », Marc Martin 2017. Schwules Museum Berlin.