Antonis Pittas has long been researching the visual language and legacy of modernism and its promise for a better, more egalitarian and democratic world for all. However, the urge for total renewal also contributed to total destruction. In 2019 Pittas was an artist in residence at the Van Doesburg House, the former home and studio of Theo van Doesburg, just outside of Paris. His residency coincided with the widespread yellow vest protests in France. Although the demonstrations seemed visually united by the yellow vests, the protestors’ motivations for change were extremely diverse. Pittas moved from the urgency of the protests outside on the streets to the historical context and the private sphere of the Van Doesburg House. It brought him to investigate the legacy of modernism through a political lens. Pittas based his project on a selection of Van Doesburg works on paper from the extensive holdings of the Centraal Museum, in Utrecht, where Van Doesburg was born and raised. As the driving force behind De Stijl, he became an influential artist in modern European art history. Pittas selected drawings and gouaches by Van Doesburg, which he juxtaposes and brings into dialogue with his own large, scale aluminum cutouts of silhouettes. Pittas captured the demonstrations of the yellow vests by photographing the protesters, the police and their interactions on the streets. They return as silhouettes in this intervention, sometimes as distinct individuals, sometimes merging into a mass of bodies. Placed in front of Van Doesburg’s drawings, they seem to both block and protect his work, his legacy. The visitors of the exhibition are encouraged to photograph the work with the use of flash, activating the installation.
Both the exhibition and the publication which accompanies it are characterized by reflective yellow foil, which is a material generally used for traffic barriers and road signs. It evokes associations with danger, visibility, warning, protection, toxicity, safety, and control. The title jaune, geel, gelb, yellow is borrowed from Van Doesburg’s Dadaist magazine Mécano, which has been published 100 years ago. The exhibition and the publication examine the failure, collapse and historicisation of the modernist ideals espoused by Theo van Doesburg, set against the current political backdrop of mass protest.
Pittas’ installation is a direct intervention in the EMΣΤ collection, specifically in a chapter which refers to political turmoil and protest in the 1960s and 1970s, when the country was in the grips of a military dictatorship, prompting a consideration of different aspects of political discontent and its means of expression. This exhibition is part of a new programme in EMΣΤ invites contemporary artists to intervene in the museum’s collection. It is the first time the work of Theo van Doesburg is presented in Greece.
Curated by Daphne Vitali
ARTIST'S BIOGRAPHY
Antonis Pittas (1973, Athens, Greece) lives and works in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. He studied at the Athens School of fine Arts; the Piet Zwart Institute in Rotterdam; the Sandberg Institute in Amsterdam; he has been an artist-in-residence at the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York; and is currently Honorary Fellow of the Faculty of Humanities, University of Amsterdam, where is currently researching and producing work under the rubric ‘Recycling History (contemporising history/historicising the contemporary)’.
Recent and forthcoming solo exhibitions have been held at Centraal Museum, Utrecht (2021); Van Doesburg House, Paris (2020); Significant Other, Vienna (2019); Annet Gelink Gallery, Amsterdam (2018); Hordaland Kunstsenter, Bergen (2017); Narrative Projects, London (2016); Stedelijk Museum Bureau Amsterdam (2015); State Museum of Contemporary Art, Thessaloniki (2015).
Antonis has contributed to group exhibitions at Ronny Van de Velde Gallery, Antwerp (2020); State Hydrometeorological Institute, Skopje (2020); MOMus-Experimental Center for the Arts, Thessaloniki (2019); Museum of Contemporary Art, Skopje (2019); Manifesta 12, Palermo (2018); MACRO Museum Testaccio, Rome (2017); BAK, Utrecht (2017); Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven (2017); Onomatopee, Eindhoven (2016); Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow (2015); 5th Thessaloniki Biennale of Contemporary Art, Thessaloniki (2015). Public commissions have been realised for Significant Other, Vienna (2019); Art in Space, Prague (2018); de Appel, Amsterdam (2018); Kunsthal Extra City, Antwerp (2017); and the 4th Athens Biennale (2013).