Annette Messager Desires, Disorders
For the first time in Israel, the Tel Aviv Museum of Art is presenting a comprehensive solo exhibition of works by Annette Messager (b. 1943, Berck-sur-Mer, France; lives and works in Malakoff, Paris), one of the world’s most prominent and influential contemporary artists.
Ever since the 1970s, Messager has been creating a wide-ranging and extraordinary body of work. Her oeuvre’s riveting, groundbreaking character revolves in this exhibition around two main axes: desire and disorder. Messager creates in a variety of mediums and on different scales, ranging from intimate drawings to impressive, monumental installations. Her art is concerned with themes and materials that draw, among other influences, on her childhood and personal experiences.
Early on in her career, Messager consolidated her social-feminist worldview, which subverts accepted conventions and presents us with a striking theatrical performance. The power of her work is rooted in the excess, repetition and boldness that characterize her images. As she declares, “My art is my religion. Good art must be deeply moving. Without emotion or desire, there is no meaning to life.” True to the French meaning of her name, Annette Messager is indeed the messenger of a fantastic, pleasure-filled and disturbing world, whose exclusive and uncompromising language represents five decades of art-making.
Installation view
Photo: Elad Sarig
The exhibition and catalogue were made possible thanks to the generous support of the French Committee of Friends of the Tel Aviv Museum of Art; The Bruce and Ruth Rappaport Foundation in Memory of Paul Amir; Rothschild Foundation, Paris; Wendy Fisher, The Kirsh Foundation; The Embassy of France in Israel; The French Institute in Israel; The French Institute in Paris; The Jacqueline de Romilly Foundation under the aegis of the Fondation de France; Outset Contemporary Art Fund and Marian Goodman Gallery, Paris
The installation "Them and Us, Us and Them" was made possible in part thanks to The Steinhardt Museum of Natural History, Tel Aviv University
