THE MORNING LIST
The program promises to be rich this fall. The Pompidou Center in Paris is celebrating the centenary of the publication of the first Manifesto of Surrealism by André Breton, in 1924, with a very large exhibition devoted to this intellectual and artistic movement. Other artistic movements in the spotlight: arte povera, at the Bourse de commerce, and pop art, at the Fondation Louis Vuitton.
“The intimate, from the bedroom to social networks”
We imagine intimacy as a secret garden, a room of one’s own, protected from others. Moral conventions and social control have nevertheless governed it for centuries, as evidenced by the dense exhibition “Intimacy, from the bedroom to social networks”, organized at the Musée des arts décoratifs under the general curatorship of its director, Christine Macel, and the historian of design and architecture Fulvio Irace. A rich journey through ages and genres, from objects of convenience to cocoon sofas of the 1960s, from the bathing scenes of Edgar Degas (1834-1917) to the photos of Nan Goldin or Zanele Muholi.
The question of intimacy appeared in France during the 18th century.e century, with its rosy-cheeked coquettes watching through the keyhole. But it was in the following century that intimacy took its mark, with the emergence of a bourgeoisie that separated family life and professional life. In the 20the century, and even more so in the 21st century.e century, everything is changing: design reflects the tension between the desire for isolation and the need for promiscuity. Social networks have ended up blurring the lines between private and public spheres. Precarity and exile finally remind us of the difficulty of preserving privacy when we no longer have our own space.
Museum of Decorative Arts, Paris. From October 15 to March 30, 2025.
“Figures of the Madman. From the Middle Ages to the Romantics”
In the Middle Ages, madmen were everywhere. Not as defined by modern psychiatry, but those who manifested ordinary madness: that of all men – and women – who, permanently or occasionally, during carnival time, indulged their passions instead of ensuring the salvation of their souls.
It is this forgotten excess that the Louvre Museum restores through more than 300 works: a journey through madness as conceived by Northern European art, which reveals a fascinating period culminating in some decisive texts, such as The Ship of Foolspublished by Sébastien Brant in 1494, followed, in ironic response, by In Praise of Follyby Erasmus, in 1511. The first opposes moderation and wisdom to the crises of his time. Erasmus, for his part, wonders whether it is not the wise, the reasoners, who are the real fools…
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