Frac Nouvelle-Aquitaine Méca, Bordeaux, France
The Méca—a vast luminous building established in the district of the Bordeaux train station, on the banks of the river— constitutes a new pole of creation, bringing together various activities of artistic production (production help, artists’ residencies, curators, art critics, from the territory of Nouvelle-Aquitaine, whether French or foreign). In its inaugural gesture, director Claire Jacquet has given a group exhibition to invited curators: “Il est une fois dans l’Ouest” (“Once upon a time in the West”) surveys the Frac’s collection by way of an unexpected presentation.
On the mission, stakes and new dynamics of the Méca.
CLAIRE JACQUET: The Méca building brings together three entities that cover almost all the disciplines of contemporary creation: the visual and plastic arts at Frac; the book and cinema at the Alca; and live performance at the Oara. The coexistence of these different departments allows for a porosity between disciplines, and possibly for collaborations between creators. It’s our task to create the conditions of these meetings. Everyone is thus the master of his or her own field, with specific projects, but which are also inscribed in an exchange of intersecting projects, if the artists manifest this desire.
On the choice of the title of the inaugural exhibition, “Il est une fois dans l’Ouest” (“Once upon a time in the West”).
The play on the eponymous title of the film is a wink to encourage the public to come and see what is happening in the West at the present time... The title refers more to the beginning of a story that is unfolding, wherein we wanted to approach the first chapter with a certain number of people that I invited to the 2200m2 exhibition space. And if we consider that a film is a kind of manifesto, it seems to me that we are here to defend a thousand and one ways of seeing art differently. This exhibition brings together extremely different sensibilities, subjects, and mediums. Some of them we have always known, such as painting, but some are new, such as digital objects or performance. The leitmotif of this exhibition is to take as a starting point the resources that are specific to this very vast region that is Nouvelle-Aquitaine (which unites together three prior regions), then tracing transverse lines out from this point that take us to Spain—with Charles Fréger, who has worked on Basque identity with, in particular, a series related to Picasso’s Guernica—to South Africa—with a private foundation based in Saint-Emilion, near Bordeaux—and toward Afghanistan—with the photographic work of Pascal Convert. It is thus a space that signals an opening to the world from a place linked to Bordeaux and Aquitaine, which has historically maintained links with Africa, and which is also interested in current issues associated with this universal cultural memory, that may remind us of the description of the cliffs of the Buddhas of Bamyan photographed by Pascal Convert. And I think that in this territorial dynamic of rapprochement with our counterparts—including directors of fine arts schools, art centers, and fine arts museums—we will be able to expand our presence abroad, especially in Europe. Again with a desire to co-produce and co-build this common culture that we still lack, because we are today at a crucial stage in the construction of Europe, and which should allow us to consolidate the culture that we share, and allow us to continue to learn from each other.
“Il est une fois dans l’Ouest”, from June 29 to November 9, Frac NouvelleAquitaine Méca, Bordeaux.