At the Palais de Tokyo, cultural actors give voice to the hubbub

The Parisian contemporary art center hosted a series of speeches on Friday evening to “not abandon the power of art to the court of current events.” A laudable initiative without being completely convincing.

AOn the top floor of the Palais de Tokyo, all the deckchairs were taken, and in the audience, we could spot both filmmaker Alice Diop and former Minister of Culture Rima Abdul-Malak. On Friday evening, June 28, the Parisian art center filled the hall with “J-2 et après,” an “assembly” organized to make the voice of the world of culture heard – too timid, not verbose enough, while the first round of legislative elections is looming and the arrival of the extreme right at the top of the European elections is still fresh in people’s minds? “We are afraid of exposing ourselves too much even though we are exhibition professionals. We are tempted to remain silent even though we are spaces for expression.”noted Guillaume Désanges, head of the Palais de Tokyo, at the opening of the event. “So as not to abandon the power of art to the court of current affairs”, around fifteen speakers followed one another during short speeches, such as the actress Hortense Belhôte or the artist Thomas Hirschhorn. The Swiss visual artist, among the first to speak, silently held up, to applause, a sign on which he was written in black letters “Take the art tool and use it!” Art = truth ».

The tone was set, and a series of uneven interventions followed. Among the most notable was that of Agnès Tricoire, lawyer and president of the Observatory of Freedom of Creation, who warned of the increase in cases of censorship and attacks on freedom of creation, a considerable threat to cultural stakeholders: “If the predicted disaster that I have seen happening for years occurs, we will need human help and financial support. We do not have the means for the task before us. We will have to stay united and united, and convince those around you, the uncle or the aunt, to go and vote. » Or the cry of alarm from the author Mame-Fatou Niang who set about reading the National Rally’s program and discovered a culture reduced to ” heritage, I quote, our “petrified” history, in the first sense of this adjective, and which holds a major place in the country’s moral recovery program: what comes will be hard, dirty and will not be new. »

In this place of “joyful dissensus », everyone then went with their own metaphor, quote or comment, more or less prepared, more or less funny. The “keep going” formula, inspired by a line from the film Thelma et Louise, inspired the actress Hortense Belhôte who, after losing her passport in Senegal, had it tattooed in Wolof. The choreographer Jérôme Bel continued with a commentary on a dance piece by his colleague of Italian origin Simone Forti: “ This rise is only possible with the support of everyone. ».

The public, also welcomed at the bar – free – gradually thinned out as the evening progressed and the speeches were sometimes drowned in the hubbub. I thought I was witnessing an awareness of the gravity of the situation, but I mostly saw a contemporary art world that is navel-gazing while LGBT-phobic, racist, anti-Semitic acts are skyrocketing,” a spectator gets annoyed, a little disappointed by this necessary gathering, doubtless a little too happily curled up in his deckchairs…