Liu Bolin

Le thâtre des apparences

Editor Editions Musée de l’Elysée
Author Marc Donnadieu, Bolin Liu
Publication date 2018
Dimensions 16,5 x 23,5 cm
Number of pages 112 pages
ISBN 978-2-88350-114-0
Price CHF 39.-

Published by the Musée de l'Elysée on the occasion of Liu Bolin's first monographic exhibition in Switzerland, this catalogue brings together for the first time an exceptional collection of works by the artist in China between 2005 and 2013. A sculptor, performer and photographer, Liu Bolin takes a sharp look at our contemporary world based on the same protocol: blending into a precise context to better reveal it to us. This chameleon-man poses for hours in front of a wall, landscape or monument while his assistants, without any trickery or manipulation, cover him with paint until he disappears completely with the chosen environment. At the end of this unprecedented camouflage process, the performance is frozen by the photograph.

Texts by Marc Donnadieu provide original insights into the principle of creating Liu Bolin's works, which carry a strong symbolic charge. What if in our post-modern society, for each individual as well as for the artist, disappearing was a protest?

Under the direction of Marc Donnadieu
Preface by Tatyana Franck

You may also like

Charlie Chaplin

The catalog of the exclusive exhibition proposed by the museum, co-produced and hosted in 2018 by the Yuz Museum Shanghai, offers a major retrospective on the master of cinematic comedy through posters, photographs and archival documents, from the actor's London childhood to his exile in Switzerland...
See detail →

Gen Z

This book offers an invigorating overview of some sixty photographers from Generation Z, born between the mid 1990s and 2010, whose work reflects an urgent need for representation and a desire to tell their own stories in a constantly changing world. In contrast to the fleeting stream of images circ...
See detail →

Kurt Tong

Following in the footsteps of a man named Franklin Lung, the book immerses the reader in the history of the Chinese diaspora, from the fall of the Middle Kingdom in 1912 until the 1950s. Through vintage images, press clippings, letters - correspondence between two fiancés - and photographs, artist K...
See detail →