the 17thmy The Lyon Biennale of Contemporary Art has been entrusted to Alexia Fabre, former director of the MAC Val in Vitry-sur-Seine (Val-de-Marne). Since 2022, she has also been the director of the National School of Fine Arts (ENSBA) in Paris. With Isabelle Bertolotti, artistic director, she brought together 78 artists in nine locations – including the Part-Dieu metro station – in the Lyon metropolis, who brought 280 works, a third of which are being exhibited for the first time and 70 produced specifically for the event which will run until 5 January 2025. With a budget of 8 million euros, it hopes to welcome 300,000 visitors (270,000 in 2022).
The theme proposed to the artists this year is “The Voices of the Rivers”, curiously translated into English (because the Biennale is international, with 59% foreign artists) as “Crossing the Water”. Alexia Fabre intends to celebrate the acceptance of the Other, taking advantage of the centuries-old use of the river network in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region which, according to her, has made it possible. “selling and exchanging products, transporting people and generating meetings”. During the visit, we cannot say that all the artists respected the instructions…
The vast majority of them are very young (the youngest, Sofía Salazar Rosales, is only 25 years old), which is reasonable, both because it promises discoveries and because half of the audience at the last edition was under 26 years old, as the organisers pointed out. However, the older ones have not been forgotten, such as Annette Messager (80 years old), Christian Boltanski (1944-2021) or the late Sylvie Fanchon (1953-2023), who taught for a long time at Ensba.
Sometimes difficult spaces
Youth, or rather experience, was not enough to cope with the sometimes difficult spaces of the Biennale, in particular a new venue, the former SNCF repair site known as “Les Grandes Locos”: 50,000 square metres, of which 20,000 is exhibition space. With a formidable, large and high room with a vault of aged concrete which, according to those responsible for the Biennale, led many artists who discovered it to completely rethink their installation, without being frightened by the “occupation” of the place: many of them, especially the younger ones, live it daily. Better still, the ruined side can inspire, as is the case for Michel de Broin: he created a strange neon calligraphy all over the vault that highlights the restored and lighter parts of the concrete.
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