How contemporary art went global
of the Grande Halle de la Villette, a former abattoir built by Emperor Napoleon III in the north-east of Paris, lay “Yam Dreaming” , a work by six men from Yuendumu, a community of Aboriginal artists in central Australia. A teeming rectangular floor installation, it was ten metres long and made from earth, ochre, paint and crushed herbs. On the wall behind it was “Red Earth Circle” by Richard Long, a British artist, which used mud scooped from the River Avon, near his birthplace.
When he finally got lucky it was partly through the misfortune of others. After he moved from Bern to Paris to be director of the Pompidou Centre, also known as the Beaubourg, the Biennale de Paris was suspended, making its venue at La Villette available. Canal Plus, a French broadcaster, joined as a sponsor. Mr Martin was thus able to stage the show across the two venues, part of it downtown at the Beaubourg, part of it out at La Villette. It opened 30 years ago this month.
Now that catalogue is prized: a copy will cost you €420 on eBay. The show it commemorates is remembered as one that reshaped the art world—and which remains controversial a generation later. These days, the two words most often used to describe “Magiciens de la Terre” are “important” and “troubling”.
Yet the stripped-down format of his show often undercut the authenticity he claimed to prize. A work like “Yam Dreaming” is rooted in a spiritual dimension that is specific to the culture of the people who made it. Seen by people ignorant of that culture and in an alien environment, it is robbed of some of its essence. The same cannot be said of Mr Long’s “Red Earth Circle”, which was much more on its home turf.
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