JUNE 21 - SEPTEMBER 15 - MUSEUM WITHOUT BUILDING - YONA FRIEDMAN

Curated by:Nicholas Vargelis, Allied Productions, Inc.Sylvie Boulanger, CNEAI (National Art Image Center www.cneai.com) in Paris-PantinIn Partnership With:Center for Architecture – AIA(New York, Etats-Unis)Emily Harvey Foundation (New York, Etats-Unis)The Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts (New York, Etats-Unis)Institut Français, ministère des affaires étrangères , dispositif IF Incontournable (France)Cultural Services of the French Embassy Museum Without Building is a collaborative and itinerant proposal by Yona Friedman, pioneer of the concepts of mobility and diversity: the construction of an architectural structure, open to creations by artists, to the activation of a performance program, of workshops and research. It also aims to create a curatorial network associating French and New York curators and artistic institutions, and to produce a season mixing the artistic disciplines and showcasing a selection of French and New York City artists.Taking the modernist architect Yona Friedman’s theory of mobile architecture as a point of departure, a group show will be staged in and around Le Petit Versailles. How can a kind of queer modernism be enacted on a utopian architecture typically marked by a heterosexual masculinity? The project aims to re-interpret Yona Friedman’s structure and to embrace our perimeters adding diversity to the beauty of the architectural object whose modular components are very flexible: inviting artists to transform the structure(s). JUNE 21- 22 - AIA - Center for ArchitectureYona FriedmanFriday, June 21/ conference / Talk with Yona Friedman and Kenneth FramptonSaturday, June 22/ workshop / Construction of Museum Without Buildings with Yona Friedman, residents and public JUNE 23 - SEPT 15 - Le Petit Versailles Sunday, June 23 / chapter 1 inauguration 2:00 PM - 9:00 PMSaturday, June 27 and Sunday, July 28  / chapter 2 inaugurationSaturday, August 24 / chapter 3 inauguration Chapter 1 artists: Thomas Adam-Garnung, Théodora Barat, Dépense Défensive & Nicholas Vargelis  BIOYona Friedman, with his Manifesto de l’Architecture Mobile has formulated and championed the idea that the inhabitant should be the sole conceptor of his own living premises within a spaceframe structure that would allow individual variations. His theory influenced avant-garde groups like the Japanese Metabolists, Archigram and many more. His projects for the Ville Spatiale (Spatial Town) concept of space frame architecture were considered utopian, until the building of the “self-planned” Lycée Henri-Bergson in Angers in 1980 and many other smaller projects, showed that he is actually a realist, merely critical of mainstream architecture.Born in 1985, Théodora Barat studied at the Nantes School of Fine Arts where she developed a body of work based on video installation and projection. Her installation work has been shown in venues such as Glassbox (Paris), La Fabrique (Toulouse), Contemporary Art Center (Vilnius, Lituanie), LABoral (Gijón, Espagne). Meanwhile, Théodora has continued working on sculpture, installation work and photography during residencies at Glassbox, La Petite Escalère, Pollen or CNES-Observatoire de l’espace.Dépense Défensive is an artistic co-operative and publishing house founded in Paris in 2017 by artist Louis Somveille and graphic designer Martin Desinde. Through alternative economic systems, they produce and diffuse editorial projects, multiples and unique pieces. Influenced by anti-authoritarian theories and practices, 19th century French literature, the Gekiga and the Shōnens, Dépense Défensive seeks to foster a free and accessible culture of protest for all. http://www.instagram.com/depensedefensive/Nicholas Vargelis is a graduate of ENSA in Cergy and holds an MA in contemporary art and new media from Université Paris VIII. Nicholas  addresses a number of societal questions in his work, defining himself as a “trickster,” that is, an inventor of situations that create interference in public space. His original training as a lighting designer comes through in the importance of this element in his installations and performances.  www.vargelis.com