Celebrate the 30th anniversary of Étant donnés, Villa Albertine’s flagship visual arts program, by exploring the work of leading French contemporary artists through exclusive studio visits, private exhibition tours, gallery talks, special book presentations, performances, and more from September 5–8, 2024.
Presented in partnership with The Armory Show, a cornerstone of New York City’s cultural scene since 1994, the Étant donnés 30th anniversary celebration is crafted for an audience of art world professionals, from curators to gallerists, critics, and collectors.
The Étant donnés program strengthens ties between France and the US in the field of visual arts by fostering active collaboration and encouraging long-lasting partnerships between French artists, curators, and collectives, and American curators and cultural institutions.
The first 100 guests to register for the free events below will receive a coupon code applicable to Multi-Day Passes and General Admission tickets for the Public Days at The Armory Show 2024 (September 6-8).
Since its inception, Étant donnés has allocated over $4 million to fund 400 projects and the work of 50 curators. Étant donnés is organized by Villa Albertine and Albertine Foundation with the exclusive sponsorship of AXA, in partnership with Institut Français, French Ministry of Culture and ADAGP.
Thursday 9/5
The Armory Show VIP Preview Day
9/5/24 | 11am | Javits Center, 429 11th Ave, Manhattan
Exhibiting galleries and artists from the French art scene
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Don’t miss galleries and artists from the French art scene at The Armory Show, with highlights in the Galleries and Solo sections.
To learn more about The Armory Show, click here.
Friday 9/6
Loup Sarion
9/6/24 | 10am-2pm | 150 1st Ave, Manhattan
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Studio Visit
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Artist Loup Sarion is pleased to welcome you to his East Village studio for a coffee meet-and-greet.
Loup Sarion’s sculptures tell stories through forms that blur the line between objects and bodies. They sometimes flirt with abstraction or create unusual scale relationships. There’s a subtle sensuality that invites touch and stirs longing. Sarion explores the idea of sweaty, textured skin and the “mechanics of desire.”
Discover his work here, or on his Instagram page here.
For more information about Loup Sarion’s gallery, Berthold Pott, click here.
Please enter through Performance Space NY. The studio, No. 3-11, is located on the third floor of the building.
Camille de Galbert x Roxane Revon x Zürcher Gallery
9/6/24 | 2pm | Zürcher Gallery, 33 Bleecker St, Manhattan
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Private Exhibition Tour
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Zürcher Gallery, Camille de Galbert, and Roxane Revon are pleased to invite you to an exclusive tour of 100 Women of Spirit +, curated by Gwenolee Zürcher. This tour will highlight Camille de Galbert and Roxane Revon’s participation in this exceptional group show.
The 31st Edition of SALON ZÜRCHER, a satellite fair of The Armory Show, invites a distinguished group of 11 women artists to show their work in the Zürcher Gallery space on Bleecker Street in Manhattan. Femmes d’esprit was an 18th-century French term that referred to independently-minded female painters, writers, and intellectuals, routinely under-recognized by their male contemporaries and publics. As a continuation of the project 11 Women of Spirit, which had 9 editions from 2020-2024, 100 Women of Spirit + involves the presence of the 11 participating artists. Salon Zürcher offers collectors an intimate alternative to the large-scale, superstore style art fairs. Here, visitors have the rare chance to speak directly with the artists.
Zürcher Gallery is located in the East Village, within walking distance of the New Museum, the Lower East Side, and TriBeCa gallery districts.
For more information, click here.
Édouard Nardon
9/6/24 | 2pm-6pm | 264 Canal St, Manhattan
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Studio Visit
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Join Édouard Nardon for an exclusive visit of his New York studio.
Édouard Nardon (b. 1978) is a French visual artist currently living and working in New York City. His paintings explore notions of esoteric symbolism, physical development, and subconscious materializations.
Discover Édouard Nardon’s work here and here or on Instagram here.
The studio is located at Unit 501 W, accessible through Elevator 5W.
Alain Kirili x SLAG&RX
9/6/24 | 5pm | 522 W 19th St, Manhattan
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Private Exhibition Tour
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SLAG&RX, New York is delighted to invite you to a preview guided tour of the new Alain Kirili exhibition, curated by Eric Dereumaux, before its official opening.
Alain Kirili (1946, Paris – 2021, New York) was a French-American sculptor known for his exploration of verticality and modeling. His work highlights an “aesthetics of spontaneity” and strives for formal unity through a diverse range of materials, all in pursuit of “organic simplicity.” Kirili made significant contributions to public art, including monumental sculptures at the University of Bourgogne in Dijon, as well as in Paris and Grenoble. Notably, he was commissioned by the Ministère de la Culture to install a prominent 20th-century sculpture in the Tuileries Gardens in Paris.
This exhibition will feature a sculpture from Kirili’s Totem series, displayed in the gallery patio, alongside another piece from the same series recently acquired by the Princeton University Art Museum through the generous donation of renowned collector Agnes Gund.
SLAG&RX, Paris – New York, represents the Alain Kirili estate.
Robin Kid x Templon x Étant donnés Reception
9/6/24 | 6pm-8pm | Templon, 293 10th Ave, Manhattan
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Special Reception & Private Exhibition Tour
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Villa Albertine, in partnership with Templon, is delighted to invite you to a tour of Robin Kid’s exhibition led by the artist.
This private tour will be followed by a cocktail reception to announce the 2024 laureates of the Étant donnés fund with the exclusive sponsorship of AXA.
In celebration of the 30th anniversary of Étant donnés in New York, this event offers a unique opportunity to meet laureate curators, artists, and esteemed jury members as well as Mohamed Bouabdallah, Cultural Counselor of France in the US and Director of Villa Albertine, along with partners of Villa Albertine.
More information about Searching For America by Robin Kid can be found here. For further details on the 2024 Étant donnés grants, click here.
Image caption :
It Is New Venom, 2023-2024. Oil on canvas, stainless steel, aluminum. Courtesy of the artist and Templon, Paris – Brussels – New York Photo
© 2024 ROBIN KID – All rights reserved.
Saturday 9/7
Sébastien Léon Agneessens
9/7/24 | 9am – 11am | The Steinway Tower, 111 W 57th St., Manhattan
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Breakfast & Book Signing
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Join Sébastien Léon Agneessens and Bienvenu Steinberg & C, in collaboration with Galerie Gabriel, for an exclusive breakfast event with stunning views over Central Park, at the iconic Steinway Tower. This intimate gathering will feature a conversation between contemporary art and collectible design curated by Valerie Cueto.
This event celebrates Sébastien Léon Agneessens’ presentation and sonic performance at NADA House on Governors Island, on view through October 1, 2024.
French-born, Los Angeles-based artist Sébastien Léon Agneessens psychodessins channel the automatic drawing process popularized by André Masson and other Paris Surrealists. These works embody the energy of waking dreams—organic color washes spread like waves, as overlapping ink drawings reveal emergent figures and images from the collective subconscious. Léon Agneessens is renowned for orchestrating global artistic platforms for brands such as Samsung, Audemars Piguet, Diesel, and Krug, collaborating with creative talents like Banksy, Run-DMC, and François Girbaud, as well as institutions like the Whitney Museum, Palais de Tokyo, and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra.
He is currently the artist-in-residence at Ralph Pucci, where he has been invited to design a new line of furniture and objects.
Roman Cochet
09/07/24 | 10am – 4pm | 40 Park St., Brooklyn
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Studio Visit
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Roman Cochet’s paintings are a contemplation on human contingency—the unpredictable, fragile nature of existence—and the haunting question of what remains when something has disappeared. Contingency, in this context, speaks to the inherent uncertainty and transience of life, where every moment and form is subject to change, decay, or transformation.
This uncertainty parallels the theme of “Deep History” in his work, where the remnants of the past persist – lingering as both memory and trace – emphasizing on the human experience within the vast, layered timelines of the Earth and its biological processes. In these ruins, he explores the tension between loss and regeneration, where what has vanished leaves behind echoes that continue to shape the present.
Hybridity emerges as a life force in these spaces, reflecting on how new forms of life and meaning can arise from the debris of the old. Cochet’s paintings are a dialogue between the past and the present, the human and the non-human, the seen and the unseen—a reflection on what it means to live within the ever-shifting currents of time and existence.
Nina Childress x Nathalie Karg Gallery at L’Alliance New York
09/07/24 | 10:15am – 11:15am | L'Alliance New York, 22 E 60th St., Manhattan
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Exhibition Tour
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L’Alliance New York and the artist Nina Childress invite you to a private tour of Glowing Heads led by Tatyana Franck, President of L’Alliance and co-curator of the exhibition.
A living embodiment of American-French cultural exchange, the artist Nina Childress—born in the US, working in France, and recently inducted into the Académie des Beaux-Arts—takes over L’Alliance New York’s public spaces with Glowing Heads, phosphorescent paintings presented in dark and Ultraviolet light. Combining a fluorescent pop sensibility with a gritty, punk-feminist reading of female representation in Western art history, Childress’ works illuminate L’Alliance New York’s lobby and gallery spaces, offering audiences an unprecedented view of the artist’s sly engagement with portraiture.
More information about Glowing Heads by Nina Childress can be found here.
Roxane Revon x PICTO NY
9/7/24 | 11am | PICTO New York, 77 Washington Ave, Brooklyn
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Private Exhibition Tour
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Join us for an exclusive presentation of multi-disciplinary artist Roxane Revon’s bio art installations and a tour of PICTO NY photo lab with Julien Alamo, founder of PICTO NY.
Roxane Revon (b. 1986, Paris, France) is a multi-disciplinary Brooklyn based artist who works across bio art, scenography and installations. She conducts experiments with bio materials to create interconnected systems that challenge our relationships and views on life, time and memories. Through drawings, mycelium sculptures and evolutive multimedia installations, she invites the public to reconsider the supposedly static and timeless environment, revealing its profound vitality and history as an integral component of the larger web of human life. By observing and collaborating with plant roots, mycelium and bacteria, she also explores the themes of transformation and our responsibility towards the world we inhabit.
Guillaume Bresson
09/7/24 | 11am – 3pm | 67 W St., Brooklyn
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Studio Visit
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Join artist Guillaume Bresson for a personalized tour of his Brooklyn studio.
Guillaume Bresson is represented by Galerie Nathalie Obadia (Paris, Bruxelles).
Jacques Villeglé x Fleiss-Vallois
09/7/24 | 12pm – 6pm | Fleiss-Vallois, 1018 Madison Ave, Manhattan
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Private Exhibition Tour
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Fleiss-Vallois is pleased to invite you to a private tour of Jacques Villeglé: The French Flâneur (Works from 1947 to 2006), presented by Galerie Georges Philippe & Nathalie Vallois. This is the first exhibition of seminal Nouveau Réalisme artist Jacques Villeglé’s work in New York in over 20 years and the first since his passing in 2022.
More information about Jacques Villeglé: The French Flâneur (Works from 1947 to 2006) can be found here.
Camille de Galbert
09/07/24 | 2pm – 6pm | The Invisible Dog, 51 Bergen St., Brooklyn
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Studio Visit
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Artist Camille de Galbert welcomes you to her Brooklyn studio for a screening of a film by Douglas Adesko about her practice, followed by an exclusive presentation of her works.
Born in 1982, Camille de Galbert is a French-American multidisciplinary artist based in New York. Her practice moves seamlessly between encaustic painting and sculpture, drawing and film. Whatever the medium she uses, this self-taught visual artist draws heavily upon movement and her past experience as a dancer.
Camille de Galbert’s work revels in form, volume and texture. She uses repetitive and accumulative mark-making as a way to explore the structures and shapes of organic matter. Her work relies on intuitive layers of materials, feelings and memory. Using wax, latex or silicone some shapes evoke the sedimentation of time, some feel like smooth skins, others can seem like distorted bodies.
Alexandre Lenoir x Almine Rech
09/7/24 | 3pm | Almine Rech 361 Broadway, Manhattan
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Private Exhibition Tour
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Almine Rech and artist Alexandre Lenoir invite you to a tour of Between Dogs and Wolves, an exhibition curated by Joachim Pissarro.
In Alexandre Lenoir’s solo exhibition at Almine Rech Gallery in New York, the top left corner of one of his canvases contains the enigmatic and alluring phrase “Tape the sky at the beginning.” Direct and instructional, yet profound and poetic, this phrase illuminates the crux of Lenoir’s distinctive artistic process and its rigorous, conceptual, physical, and metaphysical underpinnings.
Alexandre Lenoir is represented by Almine Rech.
Ndayé Kouagou x Neïla Czermak Ichti x Tarek Lakhrissi x Fragment Gallery
09/7/24 | 4pm | Fragment Gallery, 39 West 14th St., Manhattan
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Private Exhibition Tour
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Ndayé Kouagou, Neïla Czermak Ichti, and Tarek Lakhrissi invite you to a private tour of their group show, Please Don’t Be Yourself, curated by Ndayé Kouagou. The presentation will be led by Alexander Shchurenkov, curatorial director of Fragment Gallery.
Ndayé Kouagou (b. 1992) is an artist and performer based in Paris. His practice revolves mainly around texts of which he is the author. Voluntarily or involuntarily confused, he tries as best he can to reflect on these 3 subjects: malaise, power and vulnerability. The result is… what it is. He describes his work as “quite interesting, but not that interesting or maybe not interesting at all”.
Born in Bondy in 1996, Neïla Czermak Ichti lives and works in Marseille.
Her work moves between fiction and personal narrative. Her depictions of seemingly mundane, everyday scenes take on hidden, magical and invisible dimensions. In her drawings and paintings, she depicts the people in her life, be they family, friends, creatures from ancestral beliefs, or horrific and fantastic films. In her work, the monsters and hybrid beings that populate her universe act as protective figures, symbols of transitions and the unspoken. Neïla deals with inner journeys, solitude, stories and traumas handed down from generation to generation. She is represented by Galerie Anne Barrault.
Tarek Lakhrissi (lives and works in Paris) is a French artist and poet with a background in literature who explores socio-political narratives through immersive installations in the form of texts, films, installations and performances, often in connection with queer and minority experiences in Europe.
Sunday 9/8
Omar Ba
9/8/24 | 10am-11am | 161 Water St, Manhattan
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Studio Visit
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Join artist Omar Ba for a personalized tour of his studio in the Financial District. The event will feature a breakfast and a discussion with gallerist Mathieu Templon from Templon.
Born in 1977 in Senegal, Omar Ba lives and works in Dakar. His paintings, produced using a variety of techniques and materials, represent political and social motifs open to multiple interpretations. His artistic vocabulary raises historical and timeless questions while formulating a wholly contemporary artistic message. Omar Ba’s iconography features personal metaphors, ancestral references, and hybrid figures. This combination of heterogeneous elements illustrates his desire to abolish boundaries and categories. His work, with its enigmatic nature and poetic intensity, rejects all forms of didactic narrative, seeking instead to express his subconscious and his symbolic interpretation of the real.
Discover Omar Ba’s work here.
Dora Jeridi
9/8/24 | 11am-1pm | 53 Bridge St, Brooklyn
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Studio Visit
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Join artist Dora Jeridi for a personalized tour of her Brooklyn studio.
Dora Jeridi’s unclassifiable paintings are marked by a profusion of emotions and a physical experience that leaves no one indifferent. The power of her work is achieved through total mastery of color and line. Her compositions, sometimes baroque, sometimes violent, sometimes pure, are like painterly symphonies with catchy melodies. This furious need for expression is superbly mastered by juxtaposed constructions of space without being impervious to strange forms that challenge us and make us doubt.
Dora Jeridi is represented by Perrotin.
Discover Dora Jeridi’s work here or on Instagram here.
The studio is located at Unit 313.
Daniel Pommereulle x Ramiken
9/8/24 | 12pm-4pm | Ramiken, 389 Grand St, Manhattan
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Private Exhibition Tour
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For the first presentation of French artist Daniel Pommereulle’s (1937-2003) work in the USA, exhibition curators Armance Léger and Boris Bergmann invite you to Ramiken gallery for a preview of Premonition Objects.
Organized in collaboration with Galerie Christophe Gaillard and the estate of Daniel Pommereulle, the exhibition will be accompanied by a series of screenings at Metrograph (13-15 September & 20-22 September), highlighting Pommereulle’s connections to French cinema. His work is also featured in the permanent collections of the Centre Pompidou and in a solo show at Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris until February 2025.
More information to come here.
Five Artists at the Emily Harvey Foundation
9/8/24 | 2pm-6pm | 537 Broadway, Manhattan
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Live Performances & Discussions
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Please join us for an afternoon of presentations and performances at the Emily Harvey Foundation with five artists: Lune Diagne (Villa Albertine resident), Guillaume Leblon, Davide Balula with Charles Bernstein, Laurent Proux and Julien Ceccaldi.
For more information, click here.
This series of events is organized by Villa Albertine, in partnership with The Armory Show, with the support of Institut Français.