FOCUS

French Encounters Art Basel Invited Asian and French participants

participants’ biographies

#1 Conversation between French artist Laurent Grasso and Donatien Grau

Laurent Grasso, French artist

Laurent Grasso lives and works in () and New York (USA). Graduated from the Ecole nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts of Paris, Laurent Grasso was laureate of the Marcel Duchamp Prize (2008) and a member of the French Academy in Rome - Villa Médicis (2004-2005).

Laurent Grasso has recently participated to an exhibition at the Musée d’Orsay (“Artifcialis’’, 2021), overseas, he took part to the x West Bund Museum Project (2021) and to the opening of the Jeonnam Museum of Art in Korea (2021). He also presented his work on the occasion of many personal exhibitions conceived in immersive or labyrinthine measures such as Fondation Hermès, Tokyo (“Soleil Noir“, 2015); Kunsthaus Baselland, Muttenz, Switzerland (“Disasters and Miracles”, 2013) and Contemporary of Montreal (“Uraniborg”, 2013).

Laurent Grasso also took part in numerous collective exhibitions and international art contemporary biennale such as the Biennale of Sydney (Australia, 2018), EVA International (Ireland, 2018), the Kochi Biennale (India, 2014), and the Gwangju Biennale (South Korea, 2012).

Alongside, Laurent Grasso was invited to make installations in the public space such as Revolving History (2018) on the bay windows of the Couvent des Jacobins in Rennes and Solar Wind (2016), permanent artwork placed on the Calcia silo’s wall in the suburbs of the 13th arrondissement of Paris. His work is the object of several important monographs : Paramuseum (Silvana Editoriale/Palais Fesch, 2016), Soleil Double (Dilecta/Perrotin, 2015), Uraniborg (Flammarion/Jeu de Paume, 2012), The Black-Body Radiation (les presses du réel, 2009). He is represented by Perrotin (Paris) and Sean Kelly gallery (New York). Donatien Grau, artistic counselor at Museé d’Orsay Donatien Grau currently serves as head of contemporary programs at the musée d’Orsay, Paris. He holds doctoral degrees in French and comparative literature from the Sorbonne, in philological and historical sciences from the École des Hautes Études, Paris, and a DPhil from Oxford University. He served as advisor to Azzedine Alaïa for the couturier’s not-for-proft exhibition space, the Galerie (2014-2017) and curated the inaugural exhibition of the reopening of the Getty Villa, Malibu, Plato in L. A. (2018). He is an editor-at-large of Purple Fashion Magazine and of The Brooklyn Rail. He has published widely on the arts and culture of the Roman Empire, on 19th and 20th literary and art history, as well as on and culture. Recent publications include: The Transitory Museum, with Emanuele Coccia (Polity, 2018); Ways of Re-Thinking Literature, with Tom Bishop (Routledge, 2018); After the Crisis, Contemporary States of Photography, with Christoph Wiesner (diaphanes, 2019); © Paolo Roversi Taking Time, with Azzedine Alaïa (Rizzoli, 2020); Living Museums (Hatje Cantz, 2020); Under Discussion. The Encyclopedic Museum (Getty, 2021). He also holds the position of chairman of the Association Pierre Guyotat.

#2 Conversation between Aidan Li, Angel Leung and Théodora Barat

Angel Leung, Programs Manager at Videotage

Angel Leung is a multidisciplinary art curator, programmer, and writer. Currently the Programmes Manager of Videotage, she has organised a variety of programs: "Artifcial Landscape" at SOGO Hong Kong (2019), Both Sides Now V & VI (2019, 2020) with videoclub, and "Bit Street Hong Kong" at New Art Fest (2020). She curated "Sensory/Motor" at Night of Ideas (2020) and co-curated “Digital Birth - Zooming in on NFT” at Art Basel Hong Kong (2021). Leung initiated the Hong Kong-France collaborative residency program “Micromégas" in 2021 and 2022. She also worked at Broadway Cinematheque in Hong Kong and organised flm festivals, including the Hong Kong Asian Film Festival (2017) and Agnes Varda Retrospective of Le French May (2018).

Leung fnished her Master’s degree in Screen Art at Université de Strasbourg in 2016 and received her Bachelor’s degree in Creative Media at the City University of Hong Kong in 2009. She is also a researcher and writer on moving images. She co-edited the book David Lynch (Kubrick, 2017) and writes at Stand News (HK) and Agora Digital (UK). Theodora Barat, French artist

Théodora Barat studied at the Beaux Arts de Nantes before joining the Fresnoy - Studio National des Arts Contemporains. She is currently developing a research and creation thesis within the RADIAN doctoral programme. She has been awarded the Audi Talents Prize (2016), the FACE / Étant Donnés grant, the AIC (2020) and the Institute for Photography's research and creation support programme (2021).

Her work combines sculpture, flm, installation, video and photography. It has been presented at K11 - Musea (Hong Kong), Cneai, Emily Harvey Foundation and Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts (New York), Nuit Blanche, Friche de la Belle de Mai, Mains d'Œuvres, Glassbox, CAC Vilnius (Lithuania), as well as in video programming at the Palais de Tokyo and in numerous international festivals.

#3 Conversation between Sylvie Boulanger, Rebecca Lamarche-Vadel et Kingsley Ng

Sylvie Boulanger, Director of the CNEAI= (National Center for Image Art Publishing)

Sylvie Boulanger is an exhibition curator, researcher and editor. She directs the CNEAI (Centre National Edition Art Image). She is in charge of the FMRA, MULTIPLE and YONA FRIEDMAN collections, and currently developing the residency programmes for the Bouroullec Floating House. She co-founded the M.A.D (MULTIPLE ART DAYS www.multipleartdays.com) exhibition. She is the former deputy director of the French Ministry of Culture exhibition department and founder of the Art Public Contemporain production agency.

She has edited over 100 publications and curated over 150 solo and group exhibitions of emerging and international artists including Alighiero Boetti, , Hans-Peter Feldmann, Yona Friedman, Jef Geys, Wade Guyton, Cameron Jamie, Alison Knowles, François Morellet, Matt Mullican, Yoshitomo Nara, Seth Price, Allen Ruppersberg, Claude Rutault, Tatiana Trouvé, Kyochi Tsuzuki, etc.

She publishes and lectures on media art and artistic practices related to transmission, environment, and social issues in general. In this regard, she is involved in research groups and committees such as the ARTEC Consortium, the UFR A.P.E University Paris8 Council, the LabEx ICCA Paris13, the E.D.I.T.H ESADHaR Laboratory and the journal Multitudes.

She was trained in aesthetic philosophy, political science and literature: I.E.P/Science-Po Paris, Master of Research in Philosophy-Aesthetics Paris I, Lettres Modernes Paris 4. Rebecca Lamarche-Vadel, Director Lafayette Anticipations Foundation, Paris

Rebecca Lamarche-Vadel is director of Lafayette Anticipations, the Galeries Lafayette Foundation. In 2020 she was the general curator of the Riga Biennial, "and suddenly it all blossoms", and director of the feature flm based on the exhibition.

From 2011 to 2019, she was curator at the Palais de Tokyo where she curated, among others, the cartes blanches to Tomas Saraceno, ON AIR (2018-2019) and to Tino Seghal (2016). She has also curated the exhibitions of Marguerite Humeau, FOXP2 (2016), Ed Atkins, Bastards (2014), Helen Marten, Evian Disease (2013), or David Douard, Mo'swallow (2014), as well as the group exhibition Le bord des mondes (2015). She regularly Rebecca Lamarche-Vadel collaborates with international institutions, with the projects 72 ©Chloé Magdelaine Lafayette Anticipations hours of truce: exploring immediate signs (2013) and Bright intervals (2014) at MoMA PS1 (New-York), FOXP2 (2016) at Nottingham Contemporary, Landscape (2014) with the Stedelijk Museum (Amsterdam) or Des présents inachevés within the Biennale de (with Oliver Beer, Julian Charrière, Jeremy Shaw and Benoît Pype, 2013). In 2017, she was co-curator of the exhibition Voyage d'Hiver at the Château de Versailles. She regularly publishes in French and international journals and catalogues, and participates in numerous seminars and juries in France and abroad (FIAC, French Pavilion at the Biennale etc). She has a degree in Art History, History and Political Science from the University of Paris I - La Sorbonne.

Kingsley Ng, artist based in Hong Kong. Kingsley Ng is an interdisciplinary artist and designer with a focus on conceptual and site-specifc projects. He believes that art helps us to mediate our environment, whether as a viewer or participator. Past projects include Twenty-Five Minutes Older, a commission by Art Basel last year which takes the audience on a moving tram, and After the Deluge, presented earlier this year in an underground storm-water tank the size of 40 Olympic-sized swimming pools. His works have been featured in notable exhibitions and international venues. Examples include the Museum of Contemporary Arts in Rome , Contemporary Art Centre of South Australia, Guangzhou Triennial in China, Land Art Biennial in Mongolia, Echigo Tsumari Art Triennial in Japan, IRCAM – Centre Pompidou in France, Pavilion in © Photo courtesy of Expo, InterAccess Electronic Media Arts Centre in Canada, ArtAsiaPacifc the Hong Kong Museum of Art, and Art Basel Hong Kong.

Kingsley has received postgraduate training at Le Fresnoy – National Studio of Contemporary Arts in France and with an MSc Sustainable Design degree from the University of Edinburgh in the UK and a BFA New Media Art degree from the Ryerson University in Canada. He is currently Assistant Professor of the Hong Kong Baptist University Academy of Visual Arts. #5 Studio Visit with 2 women artists chosen by AWARE and AAA

Anais Roesch, international development manager of AWARE

Anaïs Roesch is the international development manager of AWARE: Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions. She has graduated in International Relations from Sciences Po Grenoble (France) and the Simón Bolivar Andean University (Republic of Ecuador). Anaïs also holds a Master’s degree of Arts in “Curatorial Studies” from the Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig (Germany). She has been working on the crossing of cultural and socio-political stakes (gender, environment, peace building) for over 10 years. Anaïs worked at the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Afairs, in Embassy, at the Pompidou Center, ’s Natural History Museum and also COAL I Art and Sustainable Development.

Gael̈ le Choisne, French artist

Gaelle Choisne (1985, FR) lives and works in Paris. Her practice takes into account the complexity of the world, its political and cultural disorder, whether it be the over-exploitation of nature, its resources, or the vestiges of colonial history, where Creole esoteric traditions, myths and popular cultures mingle. His projects are conceived as ecosystems of sharing and collaboration, pockets of «resistance» where new possibilities are created, notably with the «Temple of Love» project. Gael̈ le Choisne adds a political dimension to the concept of love by paying homage to invisible bodies, minority and fragile souls, and dispossessed hearts.

The works/installations of Gael̈ le Choisne have been exhibited in many institutions: Centrale Powerhouse (Montreal), CAFA Museum (Beijing), Pera Museum (Istanbul), MAM - Museé d’art moderne de Paris, Museé Fabre (Montpellier), Zacheta Gallery (Warsaw), The Mistake Room (Los Angeles), Bet́ onsalon (Paris), Gr_und project space (Berlin), MAMO - Centre d’art de la Cite ́ radieuse de , Untilthen gallery (Paris), Centre d’art contemporain La Halle des bouchers (Vienne), Museé archeó logique Henri- Prade (Lattes), Museé des Beaux-Arts de Lyon, etc. She has also participated in a number of biennials : Lyon International Biennial (2015), Havana International Biennial (2015), Sharjah Biennial (2017) and Curitiba Biennial (2017). She has also participated in several residencies in France and internationally such as OPTICA and Art3 Valence (Montreal), the Cite ́ Internationale des Arts de Paris, the Rijksakademie (Amsterdam) and the residency at Atelier Van Lieshout (Rotterdam). Gael̈ le Choisne is represented by Nicolletti Gallery in London (UK). Thomas Conchou, independent curator and mediator for The New Commissioners of La Fondation de France

Thomas Conchou is an independent curator, co-founder of the curatorial collective Syndicat Magnifque and curator for Societies, a Paris-based non-proft project initiated by Jérôme Poggi and supported by the Fondation de France as part of the Nouveaux commanditaires program. In 2020-2021, he is curator in residency at Maison populaire in Montreuil, a community centre dedicated to artistic practices and popular education where he will engage in a curatorial research focusing on queer contemporary practices and relationalities.

After studying cultural management at Sciences Po Lyon, he graduated from the MA in Curatorial Practice from Université Paris 1 - Panthéon Sorbonne. Between 2012 and 2016, he worked at the Visual Arts Department of the City of Paris as project manager, before joining the artist collective Jeune Création as general coordinator. After serving as public relation manager of Galerie Jérôme Poggi, he joined Societies in 2017 as general coordinator and curator. He is in charge of developing the Nouveaux commanditaires program within the Paris Region through citizen-led artistic commissions to French and international artists (such as Société Réaliste, Guillaume Bresson, Ulla Von Brandenburg, Claude Closky, Attilla Csörgó, Wesley Meuris, Matali Crasset, Eva Taulois, Goifon & Beauté, IRMA NAME, Gaëlle Choisne, Eve Chabanon, Marlène Huissoud, etc).

He co-founded Syndicat Magnifque in 2013, a curatorial collective composed of Anna Frera, gallery manager at High Art Paris, Victorine Grataloup, independent curator, and Carine Klonowski, artist, editor and researcher.

Xyza Cruz Bacani, artist, author and photographer.

Xyza Cruz Bacani (b.1987) is a Filipina author and photographer who uses her work to raise awareness about under-reported stories. Having worked as a second-generation domestic worker in Hong Kong for almost a decade, she is particularly interested in the intersection of labour migration and human rights. She is one of the Magnum Foundation Photography and Social Justice Fellows in 2015, has exhibited worldwide, and won awards in photography. She is also the recipient of a resolution passed by the Philippines House of Representatives in her honour, HR No.1969. Xyza is awarded as The Outstanding Women in The Nation’s Service in Humanities 2019, 21 Young Leaders (Class of 2018), the WMA Commission grantee in 2017, a Pulitzer Center and an Open Society Moving Walls 2017 grantee. She is one of the BBC’s 100 Women of the World 2015, 30 Under 30 Women Photographers 2016, Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia 2016, Fujiflm ambassador and author of the book We Are Like Air. John Tain, head of research at AAA.

John Tain is Head of Research at Asia Art Archive, where he leads a team based in Hong Kong, New Delhi, and Shanghai. Recent projects include the exhibition Crafting Communities (2020), which looks at the confuence of feminism, crafts, and social practice in the biennial series of Womanifesto events organized in Thailand from 1997 to 2008, and MAHASSA (Modern Art Histories in and across Africa, and South and Southeast Asia, 2019-2020), a collaboration with the Dhaka Art Summit and the Institute for Comparative Modernities at Cornell University. He is an editor for the Exhibition Histories series with Afterall and CCS Bard, the latest volume of which is Uncooperative Contemporaries: Art Exhibitions in Shanghai in 2000, and also an advisor for the upcoming Asia Forum. He was previously a curator for modern and contemporary collections at the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles.

#5 Para Site : Larys Frogier is presenting the exhibition Curtain together with Mathieu Copeland

Larys Frogier, Director of Rockbund Museum (RAM), Shanghai

Larys Frogier is the Director of the Rockbund Art Museum (RAM) in Shanghai since 2012. Curator, critic and art historian, he is involved in artistic and social challenges in post-global contexts where ongoing social, economical, cultural transformations demand new ways of interrelations, citizenship and reinvented creativity. Since 2013 he is the Chair of the HUGO BOSS ASIA ART jury and he conceived this new award, exhibition and research program as an evolving platform to question Asia as a construction to investigate rather than a monolithic area or fxed identities.

Larys Frogier is engaged in sound, music, image and text creation under the artist name Ocean. He is the co-founder of Wavz with Alfe Chua. Mathieu Copeland, french curator

Mathieu Copeland has been developing a curatorial praxis that seeks to subvert the traditional role of exhibitions and renew our perceptions of them. He co-curated the exhibition VOIDS. A Retrospective at the Centre Pompidou—Paris and the Kunsthalle—Bern (2009), and co-edited the celebrated anthology Voids. Among many others, he curated A Choreographed Exhibition at the Kunsthalle St Gallen & La Ferme du Buisson (2007), Soundtrack for an Exhibition (2006), Alan Vega (2009) and Gustav Metzger (2013) at the Musee d’Art Contemporain—Lyon or again A Mental Mandala at MUAC—Mexico City (2013). He initiated and curated the exhibition series A Spoken Word Exhibition (2007—ongoing), Reprise (2011—ongoing) and the Exhibitions to Hear Read (2010—on going, presented in 2013 at MoMA—New York.)

His recent exhibitions include Exhibition Cuttings at the Hermès Foundation in Tokyo (in view until July 2021), The Exhibition of a Dream at the Gulbenkian Foundation (2017) and A Retrospective of Closed Exhibitions at the Kunsthalle Fribourg (2016). He directed in 2015 The exhibition of a flm – an exhibition as a feature flm for cinemas. In 2013, Copeland edited the critically acclaimed publication Choreographing Exhibitions, and co-edited the radical anthology The Anti-Museum (2017). His recent book includes the anthology of Gustav Metzger’s writings (2019).

Organized by the Institut français and the Consulate General of France in Hong Kong and Macau https://www.pro.institutfrancais.com/en/pr CONTACTS

Adeline Blanchard © Christophe Brachet

Responsible for Visual Arts, Department for Chloé-Mélody Desrues Development and Artistic Cooperation, Audiovisual Attachée, Consulate General of Institut français. France in Hong Kong and Macau. [email protected] [email protected]

Salomé Bazin

Organization Manager of the FOCUS, Department for Development and Artistic Cooperation, Institut français.

[email protected]