By dint
Nicolas Muller (France/Switzerland, 1983) is interested in the margins, the interstices, the other side of the coin. In this carte blanche offered to the artist by Musée Ariana, he evokes the nature and tangible reality of ceramic and glass collections, using techniques that are either his own or that he has developed for the occasion. In the museum’s storerooms, his attention was drawn to the crumpled tissue paper used to cushion the works during transport, to the embossed and scalloped doilies used to protect a stack of plates from rubbing, to the post-it notes and handwritten notes giving an ephemeral indication of an object or indicating its absence, and to the imprints of the works in the covering of the mobile shelving.
Through drawings, videos and installations whose poetic writing is forcefully inscribed in the exhibition spaces, he tells the story of the object, its hidden face, its alteration and its absence. The relationship with collections is omnipresent: the rolls of paper rubbed with blue pen echo the cobalt oxide-painted motifs of Chinese porcelain; the gummed wall speaks of wear and tear and the action of time on matter.
In his artistic practice, Nicolas Muller acts like a developer for a photograph: without appearing to do so, he forcefully gets to the heart of the matter.
Curator of the exhibition: Anne-Claire Schumacher, Chief Curator
Exhibition until 22 September 2024
25. Musée Ariana, Swiss Museum of Ceramics and Glass
Avenue de la Paix 10
1202 Genève
022 418 54 50
www.musee-ariana.ch