Fondation Cartier Joins Efforts with Patti Smith

From March 28 to June 22 2008, the Fondation Cartier will invite everyone interested to Land 250, a major solo exhibition of the visual work created by Patti Smith, a prominent American artist and performer. The exhibition will feature pieces that appeared in the period between 1967-2007. It will introduce its visitors into Patti Smith's lyrical, spiritual and poetic universe.

The expressive voice of the artist is used to magnify the installations developed exclusively for the exhibition, representing a synthesis of photographs, drawings and films.

The name Patti Smith is widely associated with the foundation of the New York punk-rock scene. The artists and performer has been exploring the world of the visual arts and poetry since the late 1960s.

The exhibition at the Fondation Cartier highlights numerous facets of Patti Smith's creative process. She took her first photographs to be used in collages in 1967. In 1995, she returned to taking photographs using a vintage Polaroid Land 250. Patti Smith greatly enjoyed the immediacy of the process comparing it to the long process of drawing, recording, or writing a poem.

Many of the photographs taken by Patti Smith bear significant personal meaning: Virginia Woolf's bed, Robert Mapplethorpe's slippers, Arthur Rimbaud's utensils, Hermann Hesse's typewriter and other images are presented as a visual record of the artist's life, with a lot of time spent in traveling.

The visitors of the exhibition will also be invited to see a selection of the Patti Smith's drawings, with a few of them borrowed from such prestigious institutions as the MoMA and the Centre Pompidou or from exclusive private collections.

The powerful yet subtle drawings reveal a calligraphic sense of line, along with poetry and text. The drawing drop the light to her solitary side of the artist's life. Patti Smith's collaborative side is represented in films directed by Robert Mapplethorpe, Robert Frank and Jem Cohen, as well as the audio performance of The Coral Sea with Kevin Shields. Patti Smith is going to to shoot a short film, devoted specially to the exhibition.

Among the exhibits there will be presented Patti Smith's cherished belongings borrowed from her personal archives. The collection features original manuscripts, a photograph taken by Constantin Brancusi and a stone found in the river in which Virginia Woolf committed suicide.

The exhibition at the Fondation Cartier is aimed to reflect a great variety of fields explored by Patti Smith. It will be held as a comprehensive project expanding beyond the exhibition space.

The Fondation Cartier is giving Patti Smith an opportunity to oversee the programming for the Nomadic Nights along with performing herself, presenting her solo and band performances and informal poetry readings. The Fondation Cartier's bookshop will temporarily serve as Patti Smith's personal library, offering books, CDs, films and objects selected by the artist. The visitors of the book shop will have a unique chance to further penetrate into the rich universe of the talented artist.