The Loss of Human Face?

EVENT DESCRIPTION

Throughout art history, from the works of Rembrandt to Modigliani, Van Gogh and Freud, the human face has long been both a source of attraction and repulsion, an expression of humanity and fraternity but also portrayed with primitive violence and savagery. Across all its figurative and abstract representations, the portrait has been used as a mirror to the world.

The Loss of Human Face? will feature masterpieces by Francis Bacon in dialogue with contemporary artists Adrian Ghenie, Zeng Fanzhi, George Condo, and Yukimasa Ida. Over the past few months, the Villepin team has been working closely with researchers and curators around the world to bring together this exhibition that expresses how artists have used the human face to reflect the truths behind the visage of humanity. Accompanying this exhibition, Villepin will publish a catalogue including texts and essays by prominent curators and contributors including Didier Ottinger, Deputy Director of Centre Pompidou, Edwin Becker, Head of Exhibitions at Van Gogh Museum, and Dominique de Villepin.

Igniting a conversation between the past and the present, the exhibition explores the significance of human faces as seen through these five artists. Showcasing twenty major works in a transformed gallery space, visitors will be confronted with the bold canvases of these artists displayed in dialogue with each other. As one of the most influential portrait painters of the early 20th century, Francis Bacon sets the scene for the exhibition as his raw and unsettling canvases distort his subject’s faces while unveiling their inner psychologies. Ghenie’s portraits are likewise contorted in gestural brushstrokes to reexamine our collective history and memory, while works from Zeng’s ‘Mask’ series depict the social tensions and anxieties the artist observed in modern China. Conversely, Condo’s characters are rendered flat on the picture plane in grotesque and whimsical configurations, and Ida’s thickly painted canvases continue the historic medium with a futurist perspective. This exhibition will also be the first presentation of Ida’s work in Hong Kong. All these artists bring their contribution to the global understanding of what humanity means. Through their diversity and varied backgrounds, they reveal the intense rage, anxiety, passion, and ambition of our current time through their own unique visions.

In this contemporary moment, this exhibition ultimately aims to pose the question: are we still able to decipher the human face, when it is vanishing behind masks, disguising its expressions, and disappearing behind screens of this technological age? Following the footsteps of Villepin’s previous exhibitions from Zao Wou Ki: Friendship and Reconciliation to a survey of the New School of Paris with The Art of Hope, this exhibition continues Villepin’s mission and commitment to presenting art to the public as a bridge to deeper understanding and meaningful engagement with one another.

“In a world beset by war, crisis and a pandemic, many are overcome by fear and anxiety. As a gallery, we wanted to question how art can help us navigate new paths to hope. Bringing together this exceptional group of artists, we invite visitors to come face to face with the distortion, destruction, and metamorphosis of their portraits that stand as a flag to humanity. These works challenge us to reflect on our own fears and aspirations, revealing new ways of understanding ourselves and each other in this fragmented world.” – Arthur de Villepin, Chairman and Co-founder of Villepin.