Art-o-rama, Marseille
with Yann Stéphane Bisso and Isabella Fürnkäs
30.08.-01.09.2024
Installation views
Photos: Julian Blum / Courtesy: the artists and Windhager von Kaenel
Text
For Art-o-rama 2024 Windhager von Kaenel proposes a duo presentation
of German and French artist Isabella Fürnkäs (*1988) alongside Geneva
based Cameroonian artist Yann Stéphane Bisso (*1998) who enter an
intimate conversation about questions of belonging and the space that
opens up between the familiar and the unknown.Visitors find themselves amidst playful objects displayed on used furniture populating the space as part of Fürnkäs’ ongoing series Remote Control (2023-ongoing). A number of playful ceramic models contrast the flawless surfaces of smartphones. These remotes are everywhere. As tools of everyday they penetrate our lives so intricately as to spin a web of seeming control. But might there be a hunch of ridicule within the childlike allure of the prop’s sparkling buttons? How much of our lives do we trustfully transfer to these small, lifeless devices? Through our relentless feeding they become containers of data and demarkations of our identity. But in the age of ideological inertia, identity seems to digest itself through technologies of the self. And we are left to ask: Who controls the remote control?
Bisso’s sensual paintings invite us into his very own dreamlike state between memory and fantasy: depictions of bursting clouds mix with dancing animals and ghostly symbols. Through the painterly construction of hybrid landscapes, the artist is thinking about his diasporic identity, to open up spheres beyond the familiar and renegotiate the process of semiotic transactions between cultures – a portrait equally personal, spiritual and political. Fürnkäs lets us come even closer in a series of diary-like doodles: The Red Drawings (2021) function as an autopoietic archive of gestures, bringing together cycles of a fragmented but healing body.
Ultimately, Windhager von Kaenel’s proposal invites us to think about different dimensions of cultural identity and their intertwining with subjectivity.
Works
Comme elle vien II, 2024
oil on canvas
120 x 84 x 4cm
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Domain Expansion, 2024
oil on canvas
65 x 110 x 4cm
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Haie de la bonne récolte, 2024
oil on canvas
84 x 120 x 4cm
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Le bouclier, 2024
oil on canvas
30 x 45 x 2cm
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Remote Control, 2024
ceramic, glass, stones, marbles, mirrors
approx. 15 - 40 c
Enquire
Remote Control, 2024
ceramic, glass, stones, marbles, mirrors
approx. 15 - 40cm
Enquire
Remote Control, 2024
ceramic, glass, stones, marbles, mirrors
approx. 15 - 40cm
Enquire
Remote Control, 2024
ceramic, glass, stones, marbles, mirrors
approx. 15 - 40 c
Enquire
Remote Control, 2024
ceramic, glass, stones, marbles, mirrors
approx. 15 - 40 c
Enquire
Remote Control, 2024
ceramic, glass, stones, marbles, mirrors
approx. 15 - 40 c
Enquire
Remote Control, 2024
ceramic, glass, stones, marbles, mirrors
approx. 15 - 40 c
Enquire
Remote Control, 2024
ceramic, glass, stones, marbles, mirrors
approx. 15 - 40 c
Enquire
Remote Control, 2024
ceramic, glass, stones, marbles, mirrors
approx. 15 - 40 c
Enquire
About the artists
Yann Stéphane Bisso (*1998, Cameroon) predominantly works with painting, which lies at the heart of his work as a media and means of exploring socio-political and historical questions of memory and identity. Bisso holds a Master in Visual Arts from HEAD Geneva where he graduated from in 2022.
His work has been exhibited among others at Halle Nord, Geneva (CH); Espace Arlaud, Lausanne (CH); Artgenève Newheads, Geneva (CH); Centre d’Art Contemporain, Yverdon-les-Bains (CH); Centre culturel du Manoir, Cologny (CH); Kiefer Hablitzel, Basel (CH); Centre d’Art Contemporain, Geneva (CH), LISTE Basel (CH), Swiss Art Awards (CH). Bisso is the recipient of the prize Bourse de la Ville Genève (2022), the Helvetia Art Prize (2023) and Laureate of Kiefer Hablitzel (2024).
Isabella Fürnkäs (*1988, Tokyo, Japan) works in a variety of media, involving equal shares of video, multi-media installation, performance and drawing. In her multi-layered oeuvre she addresses questions of physical and spatial intimacy, the influence of digitalization on interpersonal relationships, and the transformation of social communication patterns, whereas she creates contextual shifts that echo our own vulnerabilities. She studied at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf with Keren Cytter and Andreas Gursky.
Her work has been exhibited among others at Museum Folkwang, Essen (DE); KINDL - Centre for Contemporary Art, Berlin (DE); Kunsthaus NRW (DE); Sprengel Museum, Hannover (DE); Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna (AUT); and Nam June Paik Art Center, Seoul (KOR). Her solo exhibitions and performances were on view at Museum Moyland, Kleve (DE); Salon Acme, Mexico City (MEX); Kölnischer Kunstverein, Cologne (DE); Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna (AUT); Pogobar KW Institute for Contemporary Art Berlin (DE) and Manifesta 11, Zurich (CH). Her work is represented internationally in numerous private and public collections.