Istituto Svizzero presents a new semi-permanent work at the entrance of Villa Maraini. The work consists of a newly commissioned neon installation by Swiss artist Mai-Thu Perret (b. 1976, Geneva). The piece lights the building and is visible for passersby on Via Ludovisi.

Untitled (2021) consists of nine hands, made of yellow glowing neon tubes. It almost seems as if they want to climb the brick wall in the entrance area of Villa Maraini, or perhaps climb out. Franz Kafka’s aphorism “A cage went in search of a bird”, noted in 1917, is important for Mai-Thu Perret in the development of the neon work. Thus, the question of the balance between cage and bird, the contradiction between freedom and protective loss of freedom. Mai-Thu Perret’s artistic practice is based on profound research and draws on references from cultural history, literary texts, feminist narratives, avant-garde aesthetics, and craft traditions. The neon work Untitled follows on from research on the hand, on hands, which Mai-Thu Perret has been pursuing for some time now. 

The Musical Brain is a group exhibition that reflects on the power music has to bring us together. The exhibition is named after a short story by the Argentine contemporary writer César Aira, and explores the ways that artists use music as a tool to inhabit and understand the world.

Living a secluded life far removed from the art scene, Emma Kunz (1892 – 1963) exemplified an expanded concept of art, rejecting the idea of art versus non-art and instead opened it up to a wide range of aspects - research, medicine, natural history and the supernatural, the magical, the visionary. Kunz based her drawings on questions that she drew on graph paper with the use of a pendulum. The exhibition includes around sixty of these drawings, many of which are being shown for the first time. 14 contemporary artists were invited to respond to drawings by Kunz. The work of Mai-Thu Perret plays a key role here, as she takes a drawing represented in the collection as an occasion for formal reduction, abstraction and transformation into the medium of light.

In advance of The Kitchen’s 50^th anniversary in 2021, artists and Kitchen Board Members Wade Guyton and Jacqueline Humphries have curated an exhibition of over fourty donated works. Proceeds from the sale of these works will help make possible essential renovations to The Kitchen-allowing the organisation to remain in the building where it has resided since 1986.

Known for her multi-disciplinary practice that engages installation, performance, sculpture, ceramics and textiles, Mai-Thu Perret derives inspiration from a range of twentieth-century avant-garde and radical art movements, including Dada, Constructivism and Bauhaus design. Occupying two floors of Le Portique, Mai-Thu’s solo exhibition Les Étangs is a presentation of new ceramics, patchworks and paper lanterns. Ten large ceramic pieces, evoking leaves of waterlilies, line the floor of the Portico, transforming the space into a vast imaginary body of water.

The Musical Brain is a group exhibition, including works by Mai-Thu Perret, that reflects on the power music has to bring us together. The exhibition is named after a short story by the Argentine contemporary writer César Aira, and explores the ways that artists use music as a tool to inhabit and understand the world. The featured artists approach music through different lenses—historical, political, performative, and playful—to create new installations and soundscapes installed throughout the park.

For more information, please click here.

Installation view: Mai-Thu Perret: Grammar and Glamour, Badischer Kunstverein, Karlsruhe 2019

Photo: Stephan Baumann, bild_raum

Opening at the Badischer Kunstverein under the title Grammar and Glamour is the first major solo exhibition in Germany devoted to the Swiss artist Mai-Thu Perret. The show features a representative selection of works, with a focus on current projects. Perret works with diverse formats and media, including painting, sculpture, ceramics, tapestry, film, performance, and texts.

For more information, please click here. 

Installation View: Mai-Thu Perret, Grammar and Glamour, Badischer Kunstverein, Karlsruhe, Germany, 2019

Photo credit: Courtesy of Badischer Kunstverein 

This group show features works by nine different internationally renowned artists including a new sculpture by Mai-Thu Perret, conceived for the occasion.

The Blazing World, Perret’s first major solo exhibition in the UK, explores the subject of witchcraft and the relationship between women’s oppression and the emergence of capitalism. In her immersive installation at Spike Island, a theatrical stage recalls sacred forms of architecture and is punctuated with ritualistic sculptures, puppets and textiles.

For more information, please click here. 

Preview: Friday 18 January, 6–9pm

Performance: Wednesday 20 March, 7–8pm

MAMCO presents its first major exhibition of works by Mai-Thu Perret following her nomination for the Manor Prize in 2011. This survey show will explore the full scope of the artist’s practice, which embraces disciplines from sculpture to film, ceramics and performance.

For more information, please click here.  

Mai-Thu Perret is the recipient of the Paul Boesch Art Prize 2018. The Paul Boesch Art Prize is awarded annually to an artist in the field of visual arts. The awards ceremony will take place on Thursday, 22 March at the Kunstmuseum Bern.

For more information, please click here.  

Image: Mai-Thu Perret, Les guérillères XI, 2016

Photo credit: © Marieluise Hessel Collection of Contemporary Art, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson.

Photography: Annik Wetterv

Swiss Institute's 38 St. Marks Benefit honors Mai-Thu Perret on Thursday 9 November 2017.

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