The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea and Friche la belle de mai have co-organized Echo system: Gilles Barbier exhibition in commemoration of the 130th anniversary of Korea-France diplomatic relations.
This is a solo exhibition of Gilles Barbier, an artist based in Marseille, France who receives critical attention and he is also the co-founder of Astérides (organization for young artists) in Friche la belle de mai. This exhibition presents selective painting, drawing, sculpture, installation and more with the artist’s unique artistic rule and peculiar sense of humor, constructed over several years of repetitive transformations.
Since 1992, Gilles Barbier has strived on "Game of Life". A mathematician, John Conway invented “Game of Life” in 1970, as he was inspired from cellular automaton. Afterwards, Barbier has been deciding and designing every theme of his work according to the "rule of the game". Each work of the artist is in extension with or the result of his prior works, similar to the genetics of cellular automaton.
To measure of the artistic universe of Gilles Barbier, one needs examine his life as a whole. However, this of course is an impossible undertaking. For this reason, we have designed Echo System, with selective works to unveil the core of Gilles Barbier and some works are shown to the public for the first time.
[Artist]
Gilles Barbier (b.1965) was born in the Republic of Vanuatu. This island is more known as New Hebrides (term used in 1980s to designate Vanuatu region located in the South Pacific Ocean) as it was under the reign of Britain and France in the past. Gilles Barbier had graduated Ecole des Beaux-Arts (School of Fine Art) in Marseille and he participated in various exhibitions of renowned institutions including Cincinnati Art Center in the USA (2003), Shanghai Guangdong Art Museum in China (2004), Mori Art Museum in Japan (2009), Pompidou Centre in France (2011), and Taipei Biennale in Taiwan (2014). Also in 2015, Barbier had presented several hundreds of works he had produced over 20 years in his retrospective exhibition at Friche la belle de mai.
Gilles Barbier, whose nickname is ‘person locked inside the studio’, holds his own philosophy to attempt everything and to challenge everything. He endlessly explores the world of fiction and virtual, and never ceases to be curious of new materials.
[Exhibition-Related Program]
MMCA Exhibition Talk: Conversation with Artist & Curator
Date: April 13th (Wed), 14:00-16:00
Venue: MMCA, Seoul Digital Lounge
Participant: Gilles Barbier (Artist), Gaël Charbau (Curator), Dong Eun Ma (Curator)
Content: Introduce the purpose and working process of the exhibition, Q&A with the audience
Echo system: Gilles Barbier Tour Guide
Date: Every Tue-Sun, 13:00 *Beginning from April 19th
Venue: MMCA Seoul Gallery 7 ad Media Lab
Content: On-site tour of Echo system: Gilles Barbier and detailed commentary of exhibited works
MMCA Exhibition Highlights
Date: Every Tue-Sun, 11:00 / 12:00 / 14:00 / 16:00
Venue: MMCA Seoul
Content: Tour guide on the entire exhibitions on view at MMCA Seoul
* The schedule above may change in respect to the museum circumstances.
Please visit the official website of MMCA, Korea (www.mmca.go.kr) for more detailed information.
