Artist Biography
Philippe Parreno (b. 1964 in Oran, Algeria, based in Paris, France) uses the exhibition format to explore how a space can be choreographed for a series of events to unfold. Using diverse configurations of sculpture, drawing, film and performance, Parreno transforms environments in ways that challenge notions of time, memory and reality. His work explores how systems of representation can be reshaped by space and time, as well as the visitor’s own senses.
Since rising to prominence in the 1990s, Parreno has been recognised for his frequent collaboration with experts across various fields, including scientists, filmmakers and architects. To the Moon via the Beach (2012), conceived by Parreno and fellow artist Liam Gillick, was an exhibition that progressively transformed a historic arena into a beach by covering it with sand, and then into a moonscape, This formed the backdrop to a series of onsite interventions by twenty other artists. The whole process was completely open for viewing across its four-day run. In other presentations like A Time Coloured Space (2013), Parreno arranged objects from disparate series—lamps preprogrammed to flicker, snaking assemblages of electrical plugs from all over the world, helium-filled balloons in the shape of speech bubbles—into curious landscapes brimming with alternative forms of life.
Parreno received his art education at the École des Beaux-Arts in Grenoble (1983–1988) and the Institut des hautes études en arts plastique, Palais de Tokyo in Paris (1988–1989). His work is held in major collections including Centre Pompidou, Paris; 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa; Musée du Luxembourg; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Tate Modern, London; Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y León; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; Watari Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo; and the Walker Art Centre, Minneapolis.
Notable recent solo exhibitions include VOICES (2024), Haus der Kunst, Munich; Places and Spaces (2024), Pola Museum of Art, Hakone; VOICES (2024), Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul; A Manifestation of Objects (2019), The Watari Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo; Echo (2019), Museum of Modern Art, New York; My Room is Another Fishbowl (2018), Tensta Konsthall, Stockholm; Two Automatons for One Duet (2018), Art Institute Chicago; Synchronicity (2017), Rockbund Art Museum, Shanghai; and A Time Coloured Space (2017), Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art, Porto. The artist has also participated in major international festivals including more recently Thinking Historically in the Present (2023), 15th Sharjah Biennial; Viva Arte Viva (2017), 57th Venice Biennale; The Eighth Climate (What Does Art Do?) (2016), 11th Gwangju Biennale; All The World’s Futures (2015), 56th Venice Biennale; and Fundamentals (2014), 14th Venice Architecture Biennale.
Parreno had his residency at the STPI Workshop in 2016.