当下展览 15/09 - 31/12/2024
Collective exhibition news September-December 2024
While waiting for the major retrospective being prepared by the M+ Museum in Hong Kong for Winter 2025, in collaboration with the Zao Wou-Ki Foundation, it is still possible to see works by Zao Wou-Ki in collective exhibitions around the world.
1/ Museum of Modern Art, Paris, France
The permanent collections of the Musée d’art moderne de Paris still present one of the paintings from Françoise Marquet-Zao’s donation exhibited last year: the large oil painting entitled 01.10.73 (260 x 200 cm). In the Salle Langlois-Meurine, it is shown alongside two works by the artist’s close friends: Hans Hartung’s painting T 1946-16 (oil on canvas dated 1946 bequeathed by Doctor Maurice Girardin in 1953) and Maria Helena Vieira da Silva’s Propositions contestées (oil on canvas dated 1966, purchased by the museum in 1968).
The other walls of the room show works by abstract artists who have chosen to practice their art in Paris such as Vera Pagava (1907-1988), Anna-Eva Bergman (1909-1987) and the sculptor Isabelle Waldberg (1911-1990), or other abstract artists such as Lucio Fontana (1899-1968) and Jean Degottex (1918-1988).
The works of Hans Hartung, Zao Wou-Ki and Maria-Helena Vieira da Silva in the Abstractions room at the Musée d’art moderne de Paris. Photo Y.H. All rights reserved.
2/ Hirshhorn Museum & Garden, Washington DC, USA
To celebrate the 50th anniversary of its opening, the Hirshhorn Museum & Garden in Washington (DC) has redeployed its very rich permanent collections in an exhibition entitled “Revolutions. Art from the Hirshhorn Collection. 1860-1960”, to be seen from March 22nd 2024 to April 20th 2025. This exhibition presents 208 works by 117 artists, as well as counterpoints by 19 contemporary artists.
This exhibition is an opportunity to discover one of the richest collections of post-war American and European art, including, among others Francis Bacon, Alexander Calder, Helen Frankenthaler, Arshile Gorky, Hans Hofmann, Jasper Johns, Willem de Kooning, Wifredo Lam, Morris Louis, Joan Mitchell, Joan Miró, Georgia O’Keeffe, Jackson Pollock, Robert Rauschenberg, Mark Rothko, Clyfford Still, Rufino Tamayo.
Zao Wou-Ki’s painting dated 1958, purchased by Josph H. Hirshhorn in 1959 at the Kootz Gallery and donated to the museum in 1966, is exhibited between Delaware Gap painted in 1958 by Franz Kline and Covenant, painted in 1949 by Barnett Newman.
Zao Wou-Ki. Untitled, 1958, oil on canvas, 162 x 130 cm (inv. 66.5652). Photo Alex Jamison, courtesy Hirshhorn Museum
3/ Louvre Lens, Lens, France
The Louvre Lens Museum presents, from September 25, 2024 to January 20, 2025, its new exhibition entitled “Exiles – Artist perspectives”.
The painting by Zao Wou-Ki 04.05.64 (oil on canvas, 200 x 260 cm), belonging to the collection of the National Museum of Modern Art at the Centre Pompidou in Paris, is part of the selection of works by famous artists, from different periods and geographical origins, with varied artistic practices, but who have all lived the experience of exile.
Zao Wou-Ki, who came to spend two years in France in 1948 to improve his skills, finally chose to settle there permanently. In 1957 he submitted a naturalization application which made no progress. He decided to write directly to André Malraux, then Minister of Cultural Affairs under General de Gaulle, in order to support his request. The Official Journal of November 15, 1964 published the decree of November 12 confirming the acquisition of French nationality by Zao Wou-Ki.
Wishing to show his gratitude and testify to his attachment to France which welcomed him in 1948, Zao Wou-Ki decided to offer this large composition, produced the year of his naturalization, sixteen years after his arrival in Paris from China.
04.05.64, oil on canvas, 200 x 260 cm. Musée national d’art moderne, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France. Gift of the artist, 1965. AM 4192 P. Reserved righs
4/ Museu d’Art contemporani, Ibiza, Spain
The Museum of Contemporary Art of Ibiza presents in the rooms of its permanent collections three of the four large prints donated by Françoise Marquet-Zao in 2021 in memory of her husband.
Zao Wou-Ki owned a house-workshop, built by his friend the architect José-Lluis Sert on the heights of Talamanca in Ibiza. Zao Wou-Ki went to his house almost every summer and worked in the studio. At the end of his life, he painted numerous watercolors in Ibiza. He wanted to adapt some of these watercolors into large numbered prints of 8 copies plus 4 artist proofs.
These large prints were donated to the museum by his wife. They allow to evoke the presence of Zao Wou-Ki in Ibiza for almost forty years and attest, like the other works in the museum’s permanent collection, to the community of artists in Ibiza.
View of the permanent collections of the Museu d’Art contemporani d’Eivissa. AH / Reserved rights.
View of the permanent collections of the Museu d’Art contemporani d’Eivissa. AH / Reserved rights.
5/ Musée de l’Hospice Saint-Roch, Issoudun, France
The musée de l’Hospice Saint-Roch honors the painter and writer Henri Michaux (1899-1984), forty years after his death, through the exhibition of fifty works from the museum’s collections. Until December 29th 2024.
These works, from purchases by the museum or donations (works from the Pons studio, personal collection of Cécile Reims and Fred Deux), allow to follow the evolution of the creations of this close friend of Zao Wou-Ki, met in 1949.
Their friendship will last until Michaux’s death in 1984. The presentation of the illustrated books they created together evokes this strong link: Lecture par Henri Michaux de huit lithographies de Zao Wou-Ki in 1950 and Annonciation. Moments, posthumous book published in 1996.
The exhibition also presents the works of Zao Wou-Ki’s personal collection, donated by his wife Françoise Marquet to the Musée de l’Hospice Saint-Roch in 2015, with ten works by Michaux from 1948 to 1980-1981. The companionship of a lifetime.
View of the Henri Michaux exhibition at the Musée de l’Hospice Saint-Roch, with the works of Zao Wou-Ki’s personal collection and in the showcase the illustrated books. All rights reserved/ MHSR
6/ M +, Hong Kong, China
The M+ dedicates to the Sino-American architect Ieoh Ming Pei (1917-2019) its new major exhibition “I. M. Pei: Life Is Architecture”, from June 29th 2024 to January 5th 2025.
The works of one of the great architects of the 20th Century are presented for the first time in their entirety and on such a scale, by browsing his iconic creations such as the east wing of the National Gallery of Art in Washington (D.C.), the Grand Louvre in Paris and its famous pyramid, the Bank of China Tower in Hong Kong and the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha.
I.M. Pei and Zao Wou-Ki met in Paris in 1951 and developed an almost fraternal friendship. Zao Wou-Ki will be a great support during the controversy around the Grand Louvre and I.M. Pei will repeatedly solicit his friend painter by ordering works for some of his achievements: Fragrant Hills Hotel near Shanghai around 1980, the Raffles City complex in Singapore in 1985 and the headquarters of the Bank of China in Shanghai (which was finally not completed).
One of the prototypes made by Zao Wou-Ki in 1979 for one of the two great inks for Fragrant Hills Hotel is thus presented in the exhibition. Measuring 99.5 x 91.5 cm, it allowed the artist and the architect to validate the creation of two large painted panels (280 x 360 cm) made in 1982 for the large reception hall where they still are.
I.M. Pei Exhibition at M+ Hong Kong: section on Fragrant Hills Hotel, with the 1979 prototype by Zao Wou-Ki (ink on paper, 99.5 x 91.5 cm, private collection). All rights reserved