Abstract figures at Lee Ufan Arles

The motivations that push artists to create foundations in their name are multiple. Jean Dubuffet, for example, created his own in 1974 so that it ensures the sustainability and defense of his work, and so that a large body of his work can continue to be preserved together. The structure also ensures the management of its incredible Closerie Falbala, total work of art built in Périgny-sur-Yerres, in the Val-de-Marne department, which welcomes within its Logological office. The Foundation also has an exhibition space in the 6th arrondissement of Paris, which is presenting the major anniversary exhibition until this Saturday, December 21, 2024, “Fondation Dubuffet, 1974-2024 – Chronicle of 50 years of activities” retracing the fiftieth anniversary of the entity.

Some artists create structures in their name to expose and support other creators, as for example Lee Ufan does at Lee Ufan Arles . The latter offers two exhibitions until January 12, 2025 in the south of France, one bringing together works on paper by the American Pat Steir, the other entitled “Shape-Space-Form-Faktura. Non-objective art in Central and Eastern Europe between 1915 and 1928. It is a unique proposition in its historical field that the entity presents here in its spaces redesigned by Tadao Ando. The event brings together a collection of works by artists from Central and Eastern Europe linked to the Suprematist and Constructivist movements and produced between 1915 and 1928. It sheds light on Lee Ufan’s interest in the art of this period and the development of a pioneering abstract language. It takes as its starting point two suprematist studies carried out by Kasimir Malevitch around 1915, drawings on paper acquired by the Korean artist and today present in the collection of the Lee Ufan Foundation. The point is made by the American curator Matthew Drutt who curated the remarkable exhibition “Kazimir Malevich: Suprematism”, co-organized in 2003 by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, in New York, and the Menil Foundation in Houston. The course includes some big names such as Lázsló Moholy-Nagy or El Lissitzky but also less prominent artists like the Hungarian Lajos d’Ébneth or the Polish couple Władysław Strzemiński and Katarzyna Kobro.

In the Atelier MA, a space located opposite the Vernon Hotel, Lee Ufan Arles is simultaneously presenting an exhibition by the American Pat Steir. The artist has previously produced large abstract paintings from his series of Waterfallsstreaming of paints on canvases sometimes hung in trees. The one who notably participated in Documenta IX in Cassel presents rarer works on paper in Arles. Drippings and splashes cover the support in abstract compositions which sometimes offer not-so-distant echoes of the art of Lee Ufan.