This exhibit is part of the “Exposed” project for the Palais de Tokyo, an exhibit which interrogates the vulnerability of bodies, relationships and identities in art pieces that engage with the AIDS epidemic. François Piron’s exhibit for the Centre national de la danse is a personal foray into the work of Guadeloupe-born and Berlin-based artist Jimmy Robert which echoes and expands on his Joie noire (2019), a performance he created as an homage to performer, author and curator Ian White, who passed away in 2013 and who had worked extensively with Robert. At once camp and conceptual, affective and structured, Jimmy Robert’s work starts with the body’s relation to its surroundings, drawing inspiration from Yvonne Rainer’s work; Robert creates performances, images, videos, which combine mourning and eroticism, making queer and non-white bodies more visible – bent, prostrated, tense, but also desiring – in a straight institutional space.
Jimmy Robert was born in Guadeloupe (FR) in 1975 and currently lives and works in Berlin. Robert was the subject of a mid-career survey at Nottingham Contemporary in 2020, which travelled to Museion, Bolzano and CRAC Occitanie, Sète. Recent solo exhibitions include Frammenti, Thomas Dane Naples; la musique dans la chambre, Künstlerhaus Bremen (2022); The Hunterian, Glasgow (2021); La Synagogue De Delme, France (2018); Museum M, Leuven (2017); Power Plant, Toronto (2013); Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (2012); and Jeu de Paume, Paris (2012). Robert’s performances have also been presented at Tate Britain, London; MoMA, New York and Migros Museum, Zurich. His most recent performance ‘Joie Noire’ premiered in 2019 at KW Institute of Contemporary Art, Berlin and travelled to Kaaitheater, Brussels. Ongoing solo exhibitions include Kunsthalle Baden-Baden in October 2022 and Moderna Museet, Malmo in Spring 2023.
