Chalet Society inaugurates its 2015 international program
with a first stop in Los Angeles and presents

Le Triomphe de la Renommée
Concept, text & performance by
Marie-Caroline Hominal

January 29-31, 2015
del vaz projects / Los Angeles
Curated by Patrick Steffen

With this project, Chalet Society invites curators, artists, and cultural producers, to collaborate with us and use the Chalet Society as a tool to develop their own projects in the spirit of an open source initiative.

Le Triomphe de la Renommée is one of a collection of six poems by Italian poet Francesco Petrarca (1304-1374), titled I Trionfi, describing the phases of life by opposing virtues in duels: « Fame » wins over « Death » but is defeated by « Time » and « Eternity. » In a small room within a domestic environment, evoking the intimate space of a backstage of a Theatre, the artist Marie-Caroline Hominal welcomes one guest at a time, playing with the codes of theatrical artifice to deliver an intense and intimate one-to-one encounter.

Marie-Caroline Hominal, aka MCH, aka Silver, aka Berries, aka Fly Girl, is a dancer, choreographer, and performer currently based in Geneva. Her practice includes video, songwriting, music, choreography, and performance. She received her dance education at the Schweizerische Ballettberufschule in Zurich and at the Rambert School of Ballet and Contemporary Dance in London, where she joined the National Youth Dance Company. She has collaborated with François Chaignaud, with whom she created Duchesses (2009), Clive Jenkins, Cristian Vogel, and visual artists Kim Boninsegni, David Hominal, and Delphine Coindet. Recently, she has developed a series of one-to-one performances such as Hôtel Oloffson (2013) and Le Triomphe de la Renommée (2013), as well as full length performances such as Ballet (2014) and Patricia Poses by the Pop Machine (2011). As a dancer she has worked with the Tanztheater Basel, Irène Tassembedo, Blanca Li, Gisèle Vienne, Gilles Jobin, La Ribot, and Marco Berrettini. She was a guest performer for Human Writes (2005) by William Forsythe and B.O.B. (2004) by Dick Wong. Since 2008, she has been showing her work, among other cities, in Basel, Belgrade, Berlin, Bayreuth, Bilbao, Bogotá, Bruxelles, Chicago, Dresden, Geneva, Los Angeles, New York City, Roma, San Francisco, Santa Cruz, Santiago de Chile, Warsaw, Wroclaw, Zagreb, and Zurich. // madmoisellemch.com

Patrick Steffen is a writer and curator based in Los Angeles. Past projects include Laughing Hole by La Ribot at LACMA (2013), Duchesses by Francois Chaignaud and Marie-Caroline Hominal at Night Gallery (2013), and Jerk by Gisèle Vienne and Dennis Cooper, at MOCA Grand Avenue (2013).

Dates:
Thursday 29 January from 12pm-6pm
Friday 30 January from 3pm-10pm
Saturday 31 January from 3pm-10pm
Duration of each performance: 15 min
To set up an appointment: 

Location:
del vaz projects
1600 Westgate Avenue / Apartment #208
Los Angeles, CA 90025

del vaz is an exhibition space and residency project run out of an apartment located in Little Osaka, Los Angeles. Staying true to the domestic nature of the space, del vaz provides an informal and alternative setting with the intent of encouraging conversation and dialogue. The name derives from the Farsi phrase dast-o-del vaz, meaning open-handed and open-hearted. Similarly, the space is open to artists, curators and directors alike to participate in the programming.

With the support of FLAX Foundation (France Los Angeles Exchange), Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia, and Ville et Etat de Genève.

              

 

 

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THURSDAY JUNE 19 / CHALET SOCIETY presents
THE HIDDEN WORLD, JIM SHAW’S BOOK
IN A SPECIAL ART BASEL 100-COPY LIMITED EDITION

During Art Basel 2014, The Chalet Society is proud to present a special edition of The Hidden World, an astounding archive of contemporary imagination, collected by Jim Shaw for over forty years. The book includes an interview of the artist by Marc-Olivier Wahler and a series of short essays by philosopher and novelist Tristan Garcia.

EACH OF THESE 100 LIMITED EDITIONS IS UNIQUE. It features:
- Original silkscreen prints, numbered and stamped, by book designer The Bell Angels
- Special prints resulted from controlled overprinting
- Airbrush black & white painted edges, inspired by Jim Shaw‘s Oist paintings

Each copy is signed by Jim Shaw, numbered and stamped.

BOOK SIGNATURE JUNE 19, 2014, 6:00 PM – 7:00 PM
→ Ausstellungsraum Klingental, Kasernenstrasse 23, 4058 Basel (6 min. walk from the Art Fair).

A performance by Jim Shaw will follow, as part of the exhibition Kill All Monsters.

The Hidden World Book / Special Edition will be for sale at Stampa Bookshop within the ArtBasel Fair. Special Art Basel 2014 price : 150 € (After Art Basel: 190 €)
Read more about the book

EDITOR: Marc-Olivier Wahler
GRAPHIC DESING: The Bells Angels aka Julien Sirjacq and Simon Bernheim
CO-PRODUCED: Chalet Society, Paris and Centre Dürrenmatt, Neuchâtel. Emerige Group, Paris. Blum & Poe Gallery, Los Angeles / Metro Pictures Gallery, New York / Praz Delavallade Gallery, Paris / Simon Lee Gallery, London
FIRST PUBLISHED: Koenig Books, London, 2014
HARDCOVER: 512 pages
LANGUAGE: English
SIZE: 16 x 12 x 3 cm

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CLOSING PARTY

THE HIDDEN WORLD.
JIM SHAW / DIDACTIC ART COLLECTION

SUNDAY - 26 JAN 2014 -
PROGRAM / 12 PM – 10 PM

ALL DAY LONG >
THE INVISIBLE MAN (or OUT OF THIS WORLD), last chance to experiment with your disappearance. A special box built after the drafts of famous magician Robert Harbin, and « augmented » by new powers. A unique experience by our friends DIPLOMATES.

FUSION, new video by Alain della Negra and Kaori Kinoshita, where possessed humans fuse with their totem animal.

ALL THE GODS, blacksmiths take turns all the week end long to offer a final tribute to The Hidden World Gods. Come and engrave your name on these sacred logs. Performance by Théodore Fivel and friends.

LA SOIREE >
The Hidden World TALK. Marc-Olivier Wahler in conversation with writer and philosopher Tristan Garcia about hidden agenda at work in Jim Shaw’s exhibition.
7pm – 8pm.

The Hidden World MUSIC SET. Listen to what lies beneath the vinyl covers collected by Jim Shaw.

The Hidden World BAR. After having bewitched their village with an old rhum, the gals from Valmondois will brew a new love potion especially for you. Served in a magic den imagined by DIPLOMATES. 8pm to the end of time.

AND ALSO >
FINAL SESSION OF CHALET WORKSHOPS
Last silkscreen prints by The Bells Angels and last Chalet mugs by Cecile Noguès. Sales at Boutique des Souvenirs & Bookshop with publications selected by Jim Shaw.

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Chalet Society presents

LES GRANDS TRANSPARENTS. IN PRACTICE,VOL. II
in a special collaboration with FAMILY BUSINESS

Family Business, a structure initiated by Maurizio Cattelan & Massimiliano Gioni, with guest (ghost) curator Nadja Argyropoulou, is back at the Chalet Society with the Volume II of its program.

Saturday, January 18th

7:30 pm – 9 pm  Fix Your Eyes Right Here!, a conjuring lecture/performance by ESTAR(SER), the research consortium known as The Esthetical Society for Transcendental and Applied Realization (now incorporating The Society for Esthetical Realizers).

On this special occasion, visiting representatives of ESTAR (SER), Sal Randolph and D. Graham Burnett, will reanimate the eccentric stagecraft of an American original: Inyard Kip Ketchem, also known, during his vagabond years riding the carnival circuit in the early twentieth century, as Doctor Ketch’em, Professor Katch’em, The Amazing Mr. Ketch, Yardarm von Kip, Inyard “Eagle-Eye” Kip-Katch, and under a number of other sobriquets.

Documents recently surfaced by members of the Editorial Committee of the ESTAR (SER) open an idiosyncratic window onto the career of this vaudeville philosopher, who rose to considerable celebrity in the years before World War I, as “America’s Greatest Carnival Meditator”, a distinction he succeeded in parleying into a marginal livelihood as a travelling attention artist and huckster-therapist of modern distraction.

Was he associated with the Order of the Third Bird (or related communities of ritually-oriented devotees of practical aesthesis)?  There are reasons to believe he was.

In parallel to the Family Business program, the Chalet Society is happy to present :

THE INVISIBLE MAN (or OUT OF THIS WORLD), a unique experience – a device for experimenting with disappearance, proposed to the public by the designers of Diplomates. It is a special box built after the texts and drafts of famous magician Robert Harbin, and « augmented » by new powers. This « service », somewhere between cheating and acceptance of the magic, allows one to experience the passage to the beyond and focus on the space-time that is offered then to the disappeared person.
Individual experience from January 18 to 26, booking on site.

FUSION, screening of the new video by Alain della Negra and Kaori Kinoshita, where possessed humans spread their wings and clows, fusionning with their totem animal in a space full of possibilities offered by the green backdrop.
From January 18 to 26, 2014

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ONE NIGHT KING CLUB

Saul Wahl Katzenellenbogen reigned for only one night over the Kingdom of Poland in 1586, but his prophecies, in particular those on the dawn of poetic consciousness, remained legendary. Paying tribute to the father of the Chalet Society, and in open dialogue with Jim Shaw’s Didactic Art Collection on view at the Chalet Society, we invite artists to show a selection of their own collections.

Arnaud Labelle-Rojoux
Twist Tropiques (documentary installation)
20.12.2013 – 5.01.2014

Closing Party on Sunday, January 5th, 6:30 – 8:30pm
écoute de disques idiots, cacahuètes et soda with Gauthier Tassart.

« Le points commun avec Jim Shaw serait le goût de la trouvaille appartenant à nos univers respectifs. Je ne suis pas un « vrai » collectionneur, ou alors davantage dans le sens de recueillir que de réunir. C’est dans cet esprit dénué de tout systématisme que je possède certes quantité d’ouvrages se rapportant au rire (..) Ils m’ont, pour certains, servi dans l’écriture de textes ou dans des installations. Leur statut est plutôt documentaire. Mais il est cependant juste de voir aussi des esquisses d’ensembles emblématiques d’une cosmogonie personnelle hétéroclite.» Arnaud Labelle-Rojoux

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Chalet Society presents

LES GRANDS TRANSPARENTS. IN PRACTICE, VOL. I
in a special collaboration with FAMILY BUSINESS

Family Business is a non-for-profit space, a free time-share, open to experimentation and irreverent exhibition formats, initiated by Maurizio Cattelan and Massimiliano Gioni and powered by the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College, USA. A guest + a host = a ghost. Nadja Argyropoulou is the Family Business guest (or ghost) curator. 

Family Business was until recently operating in New York. It has disappeared from its Chelsea space and has been conjured in Paris, where it reappeared emerging from the crypt situated in the alley of the Chalet Society.

Responding to Marc Olivier Wahler‘s curatorial flair for tricks and treats and getting into a loose, rather abstracted dialogue with the Jim Shaw exhibition’s vertiginous material and curiosity triggered concept, Family Business is inviting entities, people, practices into the spaces of the Chalet Society for a program under the general title: Les Grands Transparents. In Practice, and divided in Vol.I – December 2013 and Vol.II – January 2014

 

Saturday, December 14th

3 pm – 7 pm Saprophytes and their intertextual supplement to Hesiod’s Theogony, titled: Minor Bestiary II. Méth-odos Hési-ode.
Saprophytes is a collective artistic project that focuses on finding, processing and assembling preexisting material which is in a state of conceptual decay or disparagement. The byproducts of such activity are intended to form visual pastiches and new narrative frameworks, to multiply misreadings and recombinations.

The Saprophytes will create a multimedia installation, in the Chalet Society crypt, with the aim to go back to the roots, the genesis of the monstrous and the bestial. Between 6.30pm and 7pm, « an orgasmic polyphonic reading » of excerpts from Hesiod’s famous text, will be performed, by both, special invited guests and the present public, in and out of the crypt, in a procession worthy of the original myth about divine and human descent.

Open call for participation in reading Hesiod’s Theogony*. The texts will be available in French, Ancient Greek and Modern Greek and participants will be guided, through the readings about Chaos, Erevos, the Night, Aether, Uranus, Cronus, Gaia, the muses, the Gods, Eros and the Titans to a better grasp of the relevant overwhelming visual legacy and its contemporary ramifications.

3 pm – 6 pm  Workshop Scare(crow)s abound
Taking its cue from the Saprophytes’ research and the uncanny creatures described in Hesiod’s Theogony, the workshop is open to everyone and will point to the world wide rich tradition and diverse practice of making scarecrows, i.e. effigies, decoys, guardians and boogie-structures, which extends from rural customs, to comics, Japanese deities, mythology, a Pink Floyd song, films, musicals, books and more. Every one is invited to bring materials, information, ideas or even ready to install scarecrows*. Artists will teach the practice and stories will be recounted.

7  pm   Je est un autre, Lecture performance with Philippe Charlier
The famous forensic pathologist and archéo-anthropologist, author of Les Monstres Humains dans l’Antiquité, will show a stunning collection of mythological and real monsters and explain how they relate to our fear of the other.

8 pm   Awards Ceremony for The Best Scarecrow
The public will vote for the winner who will receive a secret prize. The fruits of the day’s labors can be exchanged among their makers or stay to protect the Chalet Society premises.

Chalet Workshops
Family Business enters into a cosmogonic interaction with the artists residents of the Chalet Society : a special silkscreen print will be edited by The Bells Angels aka Julien Sirjacq & Simon Bernheim and a performance proposed by Théodore Fivel.

And finally, Fool Moon Crêperie
is getting into fool mood business by offering a special Family Aquarius crepe in honor of the Family Business birth sign.

*please note that no special skills are required for participation in the Theogony reading or the scarecrows workshop: It is all about practices!
*as Walter Benjamin put it, « I have nothing to say; only show »

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ONE NIGHT KING CLUB

Saul Wahl Katzenellenbogen reigned for only one night over the Kingdom of Poland in 1586, but his prophecies, in particular those on the dawn of poetic consciousness, remained legendary. Paying tribute to the father of the Chalet Society, and in open dialogue with Jim Shaw’s Didactic Art Collection on view at the Chalet Society, we invite artists to show a selection of their own collections.

Pierre Leguillon.
Selection from the Collection Musée des Erreurs, Bruxelles
11.12. – 19.12.2013

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