Deborah De Robertis

Deborah De Robertis (* 1984 ) is a Luxembourg Performance - artist . The American Huffington Post counted their 2014 action L'Origine du monde at the Musée d'Orsay among the “20 most confusing art performances of all time”.

Life

Deborah De Robertis studied at the art school in Brussels . In her performances, she questions traditions and conventions, for example in relation to the relationship between artist and curator or gallery owner, as well as between men and women. In July 2013 she was selected by the jury of the Luxembourg Ministry of Culture for the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris on the basis of the projects she had carried out . She worked there from September to November 2013. During this time, the photo series Miroir de l'origine was created . It documents a series of spectacular actions in which De Robertis exposed her vulva in front of works of art in museums and had herself photographed, including in the installation Chapelle by Wim Delvoye at the Musée d'Art Moderne Grand-Duc Jean in Luxembourg.

In her performance on May 29, 2014 entitled Miroir de l'origine (Mirror of Origin), she dealt with the painting L'Origine du monde (Origin of the World) by Gustave Courbet from 1866. In a gold sequin dress she went to the Musée d'Orsay in Paris and presented her open vulva in front of the painting, in contrast to Courbet's realistic representation, in which the legs are open but the vulva is painted closed. In a video she documented her performance, backed by the Hymn to the Virgin of Franz Schubert and her voice repeating: "Je suis l'origine / Je suis toutes les femmes / Tu ne pas vue m'as / Je veux que do me reconnaisses / Vierge comme l'eau / Créatrice du sperme ».

The action caused a sensation; Museum guards sent applauding museum visitors from the room. The artist was taken away by the police, but released again shortly afterwards. The museum management announced that their staging was a disregard of the rules of the museum, regardless of the artistic performance. De Robertis explained, “If you ignore the context, you could construct the performance as an act of exhibitionism, but what I did was not an impulsive act. There is a void in art history, that is the absent gaze of the object. […] I do not show my vagina, but I reveal what we do not see in the painting, the eye of the vagina, this black hole that is hidden from view, the abyss that opens up beyond the flesh into infinity Origin of Origin. "( Deborah de Robertis : quoted in: The Huffington Post Art & Culture)

reception

Le Monde described the performance L'Origine du monde by Deborah De Robertis as a remake of Courbet's painting. Viewed in isolation, the action can be understood as a provocation, according to art historian Bettina Heldenstein from Casino Luxembourg - Forum d'Art Contemporain . But there is a real continuity in De Robertis's artistic work. You provoke situations that change your perspective. For Kathrin Brooks, chief cultural editor of the American Huffington Post, L'Origine du monde is one of the “20 Most Confusing Performance Art Pieces Of All Time” alongside those by u. a. Marina Abramović and Carolee Schneemann . The art critic Valérie Duponchelle discussed the performance of De Robertis in her essay L'art, une affaire de femmes (The art, a matter of women) and compared it with the nude actions of the Swiss conceptual artist Milo Moiré . The Spanish newspaper ABC also placed the unannounced performance of De Robertis in a row with earlier, similar actions by Valie Export in 1969 and Marina Abramovic in 2005.

Web links

Deborah De Robertis in the Internet Movie Database (English)
Biographical note at the International Film Festival Rotterdam
Valérie Duponchelle: Deborah De Robertis et son Origine du monde: “Je veux mettre à nu tous les regards” , interview in Le Figaro , June 7, 2014
Entrevue avec l'artiste Deborah De Robertis: Nue devant L'Origine du monde. Interview. Arts & Culture, Ici Radio-Canada, June 16, 2014, accessed November 7, 2014 (French, audio file).
Deborah de Robertis: Les Hommes de l'Art (Trailer on Vimeo)

Individual evidence

^ Deborah De Robertis est sélectionnée pour la résidence d'artiste 2013 à la Cité internationale des arts de Paris. (No longer available online.) Ministère de la Culture, Grand-Duché de Luxembourg, July 2013, archived from the original on June 6, 2014 ; Retrieved June 7, 2014 (French). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.

↑ ^a ^b Fatima Rougi, Philip Weber: "A scene in front of my vagina and my eyes". L'essentiel, June 5, 2014, accessed June 6, 2014 .

↑ ^a ^b ^c Luxembourg artist flashes Paris museum-goers. Luxemburger Wort, June 3, 2014, accessed June 6, 2014 (English).

↑ Benjamin Sutton: Artist enacts Origin of the World at the Musée d'Orsay - And, Yes, That Means What You Think. Artnet, June 5, 2014, accessed June 14, 2014 .

↑ ^a ^b Malik Teffahi-Richard: A Orsay, un remake of "L'Origine du monde". Le Monde Culture, June 5, 2014, accessed November 6, 2014 (French).

↑ I am the origin / I am all women / You haven't seen me / I want you to recognize me / Virgin like water / Creator of sperm . (own translation)

^ The scandalous Courbet painting. "L'Órigine du Monde" at the Fondation Beyeler . Cultural theme on September 5, 2014 by Kathrin Hondl, SWR2

^ Performance in the Paris Museum. Artist exposes herself in front of "The Origin of the World" ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Monopoly , June 10, 2014@1@ 2