1. Peer Reviewed
Title:
Re-Branding Post 1945 Paris: Exhibiting Powers and Contemporary Art
Journal Issue:
Paroles gelées, 26(1)
Author:
Tiso, Elisabeth, City University of New York
Publication Date:
2010
Publication Info:
Paroles gelées, UCLA Department of French and Francophone Studies, UC Los Angeles
Permalink:
http://escholarship.org/uc/item/6x7934rr
Keywords:
Paris, Post-War France, FIAC, spectacle, Nuits blanches, 20th Century Arts, Visual Arts, French,
Cultural Studies, Europe, André Malraux, Grand Palais, Foire internationale d'art contemporain,
Nuit Blanche, Force de l’art, George Pompidou
Abstract:
This paper will examine the expanded role Contemporary art has assumed in rebranding Paris,
France’s flagship capital, as a cutting edge, technological, innovative and competitive global city.
Paris has effectively incorporated contemporary art into the fabric of the whole city with exhibitions
such as those originating at the Grand Palais spreading to venues throughout the inner and outer
‘quartier’. France has used arts and culture to claim supremacy in the world whether colonial
or local for centuries with Paris the ultimate ‘brand’. Post WWII Paris however, saw this brand
diminished and claims to artistic supremacy replaced by New York. In an effort to regain some
relevancy Paris, and by extension France, began the process of re-branding concordant with
political, economic and technological advancement through the fervent promotion of contemporary
art. Contemporary Paris through contemporary art aspires to a transnational and post-national site
of spectacle; a leading locus for art to be consumed. Paris’s mass contemporary art consumption
era began in 1972 with De Gaulle’s efforts to replace military and imperial power with cultural
dominance (though the recent concurrent inaugurations of outposts for the French military and the
Louvre in Abu Dhabi may suggest a ‘rapprochement’ of the domains), inaugurating a litany of new
contemporary exhibitions, art fairs, monuments and museums. Furthermore, with the redefinition
of contemporary French art from an art produced by French artists to art produced in the “territory
of France”, this universalizing re-branding of contemporary art attempts to validate Paris’s claim to
global cultural supremacy. I discuss particular events such as the art fair FIAC, La Force de L’ Art
and Monumenta to illustrate the use of Contemporary art to shape and brand contemporary Paris.
2. Supporting material:
1. Grand Palais built in 1900
2. FIAC 2008 at the Grand Palais
3. FIAC, 2008, interior of the Grand Palais
4. Richard Serra’s Clara Clara in the Tuileries Gardens
5. FIAC 2008, Tuileries gardens. Inflatable plane by Dutch artist Alexander Mir and bathtub by
unknown artist in the foreground
6. Dans la Nuit des Images, Charles Sandison’s manifesto Proclamación Solemne, 2008,
illuminates the Grand Palais’s façade at night. Photo: Collection Grand Palais, Francoise Tomasi
7. Nuit Blanche 2009 Parisan zones. Map from Nuit Blanche website
8. La Force de l’Art, 2008 at the Grand Palais. “Arch of Triumph” by Mircea Cantor. In the
foreground the Romanian artist’s gilded version of a typical Romanian farmer’s gate built to ward-
off evil
9. Map of Paris. The green line marks the périphérique. Montrouge is located in the south, slightly
beyond the Porte D’Orleans
