Kader Attia Solo Exhibition "The Poetry of Myth and Void"

Arid et genereux (detail) Cement brick environmental installation 2008. Kader Attia's solo exhibition "The Poetry of Myth and Void" runs from May 17 to June 28 at the Anne de Villepoix Gallery. Born in Paris in 1970, Kader Attia is a French artist of the new generation, a second-generation immigrant who navigates between France and Algeria. Against this unique dual cultural and political background, his artistic creation is built on questioning current French cynical politics, exploring themes established through psychoanalytic and philosophical discourse. According to the artist, "void" is the matrix and contradictory symbol of our era. This characteristic element internally transforms the form of works just as experience thinks. As I further explore "void," which is clearly present in the society we live in, I find increasingly sharp contrasts. Socially, our world is becoming more fragile, lacking confidence in the future, which is so uncertain. From an artistic perspective, this allows us to compare "void" where it is thought and find parallels, practicing there a test of ideas for the future, and exploring its plans within it.

In the first exhibition room, Kader Attia presents two photographs of Jerusalem: one shows the arches of a mosque, creating endless freedom of entry and exit. The other shows a cement wall blocking a checkpoint at an intersection. Under mutual contrast, they elucidate the concepts of void and substance, clearly pointing out a political stance and viewpoint. Another series on the wall consists of loudspeakers used by riot police, standing upright from the floor to the ceiling, forming "infinitely extending columns," displaying silent politics in a visual representation of sound. Next, a series of five supermarket plastic bags sits on a table, empty inside, probing the void and substance of matter, using fragile objects and behavioral metaphors to imply a political and institutional absence or deliberate abandonment.

In another room, a large series of cement bricks are stacked and constructed, projecting the swaying metaphor of the "Square Rock Plaza" memorial in Algeria, mocking the humble prayers of crowds before mosques and satirizing Algeria's cynical religious politics. Finally, a series of sketches seeking self-identity depicts a plastic bag, a space of memory—reflecting this mutable identity and history. Kader Attia provides people with such political and social myths, leading through reality and poetry to a form of truthful imagery, elucidating the politics and reality he inhabits; art is a form of struggle and consciousness of existence.