Paillettes et Dépendances ou la fascination du néant
Every square meter of the museum’s exhibition space was filled to bursting with the work of Sylvie Fleury (1961, Geneva). Her signature work, Shopping Bags, shared the limelight with rainbow-colored mushrooms and petrified stalactite forests that enveloped the visitor in a primordial universe, blinding them and creating mystical, solitary experiences, a womb for rebirth. After the glamour
of the first section of the exhibition came parallel worlds and therapeutic travel. On every floor, Mondrian, Fontana, César, Buren, Vasarely, Andre were recycled and customized: one with faux fur, another with nail polish. Stepping from one floor to the next, visitors passed race cars smashed by She Devils on Wheels and lipstick-colored rockets, optical illusion wall paintings, and toys for huge dogs, nice friendly monsters dozing in the stifling air of hallucinogenic fumes. The exhibition followed a 1980s display strategy that created a blur of ideas and aesthetics, a space where fashion, advertising, design, and art all meld. The stairway served as the nerve center for the exhibition, as in a department store. The randomness of the spaces was tempered by the seriousness and
austerity of immense metal pendulums, making each level change an occasion to refocus thoughts. In the pale,
ice-blue glow of the neon signs, time was suspended, and the museum’s function as a factory was recalled. It was a dream factory, a manufacturer of desire for glitter and emptiness.