Benoit Billotte

Diplômé de l’École supérieure d’art de Metz et de la Haute école d’art et de design de Genève, Benoît Billotte participe à différentes expositions collectives dont, en 2017, L’Éloge de l’heure au Centre d’innovation et de design du Grand Hornu, en 2016 Horizon au Magasin cnac de Grenoble, en 2014 Monument au Musée des beaux-arts de Calais et au Frac Normandie de Caen, ou encore en 2013 à Une brêve histoire des lignes au Centre Pompidou-Metz.

Son travail fait l’objet d’expositions personnelles, avec, en 2018 Notabile Mirabile au Musée des Antiquités de Rouen, en 2016, Is here somewhere else? au Pavillon MOCA de Shanghai, en 2015 Les Traversées  à la Villa du Parc à Annemasse, ou encore en 2014 Passeggiata à Halle Nord, Genève.

En 2016, il obtient une résidence à Shanghai avec Pro Helvetia, en 2013 à l’Institut Suisse de Rome et en 2010 au centre d’art Parc Saint Léger à Pougues-Les-Eaux. Il est accueilli en 2018 à l’Institut français du Maroc de Tetouan, à la Casa Suiza de Buenos Aires et en 2019 à la Fondation Casa Proal au Mexique. 

Son œuvre se fonde premièrement sur le dessin, la ligne étant appréhendée tant dans la qualité de trace, de limite, d’objet que de surface – modulable, transformable, adaptable, et se développe en installations de plus en plus complexes. Tel un arpenteur, Benoît Billotte collecte les informations et les ressources documentaires qui nous entourent. Traduites en statistiques, cartes, plans, architectures, il révèle alors les diverses formes de propagandes douces dans lesquelles nous évoluons.

Il vit et travaille à Genève, Suisse, et à Metz, France.

DR / Benoit Billotte

theskinnytype

TheSkinnyType works are focused primarily on hand-cut photographic collages that create idyllic scenarios of young love and intimacy that delicately float between idealism and naturalism and play with different representations of the male figure. These scenes are explored from the dreams and fantasies of an observer who is driven either by the desire of realising impossible scenarios of narcissistic love, or looking for intimate moments created from characters and situations that share nothing in common other that the desire to unite two or more figures together. 

These sensual interactions between one guy and himself and the desire to observe these interactions from a voyeuristic perspective are a constant theme throughout TheSkinnyType’s work and form the foundation to his ongoing series ‘Narcissus Dreams’. Carefully selecting his images from magazines and books of photographers that he loves, TheSkinnyType cuts, arranges and glues his pieces by hand to create realistic compositions that are simultaneously tinged with the idealism of a renaissance painting; youthful muscular figures, representing their sinuosity to perfection with a clarity of line and delicate use of light and colour. 

Crucial to TheSkinnyType’s practice is the nondigital process and the constraints that analogue imposes on us. For TheSkinnyType, being constrained by the physicality and rigidness of the raw material adds to the excitement when two different images are combined to generate a new story or composition – no image is manipulated, scaled, mirrored or filtered. In his unprecedented ability to merge each image with such precision and charm, one likens his work to the traditions of classical sculpture, the history of painting of past centuries, as well as to modernist art movements such as Impressionism. 

More recently, TheSkinnyType has shifted his focus to his series ‘Superimpositions’. These works involve a different type of process whereby he selects pages with images on both sides and superimposes them, to curate a beautifully, visually arresting dialogue between the two existing scenarios. 


IG / @theskinnytype
DR / theskinnytype

Lang / Baumann, a retrospective view

Sabina Lang (*1972) and Daniel Baumann (*1967) live in Burgdorf (Switzerland) and have collaborated since 1990. Their body of work includes installations, sculptures, large-scale wall or floor paintings, and architectural interventions. The two artists work in a wide range of materials—wood, metal, paint, carpet and inflatable structures—but their true medium is space. Most of their works are site-specific, some are modular and can be adapted to different situations. Many of their pieces can not only be viewed but actually used as well while others merely feign usability or artfully subvert it.

Through careful prior analysis of the location and context of their interventions, Lang/Baumann initiate a dialogue with the existing situation, often playfully upending expectations and disrupting patterns of perception. With their opulent imagery they deliberately seek a delicate balance between clearly defined categories like public and private space, familiar and strange, art and functionality.


Beautiful Steps #2
Exhibition: 2009, « Utopics. 11th Swiss Sculpture Exhibition » Art in urban space, Biel-Bienne
Curator: Simon Lamunière Courtesy: Kunstsammlung der Stadt Biel-Bienne CH

Open
Solo show: 2012, « Open » Grand Palais, Bern CH
Curator: Chantal Meng, Juliane Wolski

Spiral #3
Group show: 2013, « Of Bridges & Borders » Monjas, Valparaiso CL
Curator: Sigismond de Vajay

Beautiful Tube #2
Solo show: 2014, Parc Jean-Jacques-Rousseau, Ermenonville F
Curator: Corinne Charpentier

Up #1
Solo show: 2014, « Up #1 » sic! Raum für Kunst / Elephanthouse, Luzern CH
Curator: Nadine Wietlisbach

Beautiful Bridge #2
Group show: 2016, « Tokyo Art Flow » Futakotamagawa Station area, Tokyo JP
Curator: Spiral/Wacoal Art Center

Comfort #14
Group show: 2016, Biela noc, Košice/Bratislava SK
Curator: Zuzana Pacáková

Beautiful Windows #3 (Daria’s Belt)
Group show: 2017, « Cosima von Bonin, Lang/Baumann, Hannah Weinberger » Zabriskie Point, Genève CH
Curator: Yoan Mudry, Laure Marville, Roxane Bovet

Up #3
Group show: 2017, « Un été au Havre » Plage / Porte Océane, Le Havre F
Curator: Jean Blaise

Street Painting #9
Solo show: 2017, « Theaterplatz » Luzerner Theater, Luzern CH
Curator : Benedikt von Peter

Beautiful House #2
Permanent work: 2017, Le Confort Moderne, Poitiers F
Curator: Yann Chevallier
Courtesy: Ville de Poitiers

Module #5 (Kunsthalle Bar)
2018, « 100-Jahr-Jubiläum » Kunsthalle, Bern CH

Comfort #17
Solo show: 2018, le 109, Pôle de cultures contemporaines, Nice F
Curator: Cédric Teisseire

Up #4
Solo show : 2020, Rolex Learning Center EPFL, Lausanne CH
Curator: Véronique Mauron Layaz

Beautiful Steps #17
Group show: 2020, « 7th Gherdëina Biennial » , Ortisei I
Curator: Adam Budak

DR / Lang Baumann

Jean-Philippe Volonter

Born in 1985 in Ajaccio
Lives and works between Ajaccio and Lausanne

LAST EXHIBITIONS
Archipel ouest, iles du futur, curated by Anne Alessandri, Luigi Fassi, Emanuela Manca, Nekane Aramburu, 2020, FRAC CORSICA, Corti
Post Tenebras Lux, 2019, Ajaccio, solo exhibition
Filitosa, Les mouettes, curated by collectif RATS, 2015, Vevey, solo exhibition
Banana Split, Galerie Sonnenstub, 2013, Lugano
Unter 30 Kunsthaus Glarus, 2012 Glarus
Swiss Art awards 2012, Basel
Maquis, Broom, 2011, curated by Veronique Yersin, Geneve, solo exhibition
The Harder They Com, Duplex, Curated by Thomas Bonny , 2011, Geneve
The Rooms, curated by collectif RATS, 2011,Vevey
Splendid, Duplex, Curated by Yves Levasseur & Julie Osen, 2010, Geneve
Avant-Gout, Live in your Head, avec Norbert Bisky, 2009, Geneve
Frankenstein II, curated by Alexandre Bianchini and Pascal Rousson, Vegas Gallery, 2008, London Frankenstein I, curated by Alexandre Bianchini and Pascal Rousson, Espace Forde, 2008, Geneve


Contact : STUDIO – 5 rue San lazaro,
20000 Ajaccio
TEL- 06.66.79.66.54
MAIL- jeanphilippevolonter@me.com