Mime Works from the Gensollen Collection

Marc and Josée Gensollen, La Fabrique, Marseille from Collectorspace on Vimeo

Julien Bismuth’s Mime Works I-IV (2010) consists of two elements: the visual scores and the performance. Initially produced with the mime Gregg Goldston, each piece gives reference to a series of characters, ranging from a spectator in a gallery to someone who gives shape to a polymorphic object with his hands. In this work, ordinary gestures and postures are presented in isolation, removed from words and objects. In doing so, Bismuth questions forms of behavior and situations of everyday life, as well as our relationship with the art object.

Curated by Teresa Calonje, Mime Works from the Gensollen Collection brings Bismuth’s work from a private collection in Marseille to collectorspace in Istanbul. The mime artists Gregg Goldston and Eric Wilcox will repeat the performance at scheduled and random times throughout the exhibition. Between performances, the exhibition space remains occupied by four framed visual scores of the movements. Bismuth thereby raises the question of what remains after the performance: Where lies the residue—in the viewer’s memory or the performer’s body? 

Mime Works I-IV reflects Josée and Marc Gensollen’s interest in the acquisition of artworks that are verbal and/or gestural, with no physical trace. As practicing psychiatrists the Gensollen carry the intangible quality of their profession into their collection, by focusing on works that are based on encounter, language, conversation, and process. 

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Julien Bismuth works at the interface of visual art and literature. The artist holds an MA from Goldsmith’s College, London, and is a PhD candidate in literature at Princeton University. His one-person exhibitions include INVISIBLE-EXPORTS, New York; Emanuel Layr, Vienna; Simone Subal Gallery, New York; the Box, Los Angeles; GAK Kunstverein, Bremen; and Galerie Georges-Phillipe & Nathalie Vallois, Paris. He participated in groups shows at ICA Philadelphia; 12e Prix Fondation d’entreprise Ricard, Paris; Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt; Villa Arson, Nice; Musée du Jeu de Paume, Paris; and Orange County Museum, Newport Beach, CA, among others. Bismuth founded the publishing house Devonian Press with Jean-Pascal Flavien in 2005.

Gregg Goldston is an internationally acclaimed mime artist based in New York. In 1975, Goldston saw a performance by Marcel Marceau, and immediately set upon a lifelong pursuit of the art of mime. For over 35 years, Goldston has toured his solo performances across the USA, Asia, and Europe. He established The Goldston School for Mimes in 1980, which during its 30-year history hosted five seminars in collaboration with Marcel Marceau, who also served as the School’s Artistic Advisor. In 2008, Goldston created his second summer Mime Intensive in Warsaw, Poland and in July 2013, he will open an advanced Intensive based in Rome, Italy.

Eric Wilcox is a farm boy from Iowa. He ran away with a circus when he was nineteen, then studied at the Goldston MIme School for twelve years and toured the world as a solo mime. With his resident theater company the SF Buffoons in San Francisco he authored plays; Divided We Fall and The Hasheesh Eater, also performed in New York City. In January, Wilcox produced a sold out run of Oscar Wilde in San Francisco at a pocket theater in Tarlabaşı. He is currently developing a duo pantomime show called Imagine! Now! with German mime Jan Romberg, as a project of Mind-Movement Research, based in Dresden and Istanbul.

Teresa Calonje is an art historian and curator based in London. She is currently working on a book that aims to unfold issues on collecting, preserving and re-enacting live art. The book is due to be published at the end of 2013 by Koenig Books.

Marc and Josée Gensollen have been collectors and patrons of contemporary art for over thirty years. The couple lives in a converted factory called La Fabrique that serves as home to the collection as well as a hub for the local art community. The Gensollen Collection includes numerous conceptual artworks from the 1960s and 1970s by artists such as Dan Graham, Lawrence Weiner, Ian Wilson, and Sol LeWitt, as well as more recent works by Maurizio Cattelan, Liam Gillick, Dominique Gonzales-Foester, Douglas Gordon, Philippe Parreno, and Tino Sehgal among many others.

Image: Courtesy of the artist.