Hajime Sorayama Japan, b. 1947

Charles Riva is particularly fond of this idea of putting works of different origins in relation, which stems from his desire to break away from the white cube concept which is typical for contemporary art galleries. The collaboration with François Laffanour, whom he has known for a long time, was therefore a natural choice: a cross between furniture and graphic arts, mutually enriching each other, with pieces of exceptional quality, hence the ambitious title of the exhibition LEVEL.

The exhibition presents on one hand, modern design, with major figures such as Jean Prouvé, Pierre Jeanneret and Le Corbusier, enhanced with some poetic design pieces by contemporary Korean designer, Choï Byung Hoon. On the other hand, the public will discover a selection of works by contemporary American artists such as Paul McCarthy, Richard Prince and the conceptual artist Christopher Woo. The exhibition creates an aesthetic complementarity between these two worlds, under the watchful eye of François Laffanour and Charles Riva. Through this collaboration, the duo implement the vision of art they share: to enhance the works by contextualizing them, by creating real living spaces at the crossroads of interior architecture.

This exhibition stages a dialogue between the radical elegance of Pierre Paulin’s furniture and the powerful visual language of eminent and singular artists including Alexander Calder, Francis Bacon, Philip Guston,...