FRONTIER – JEAN-LUC MEYER ABBATUCCI – OUTCASTS INCORPORATED – TEXT BY GERALDINE POSTEL

Dear shaded viewers,

Yesterday in the middle of le Marais, the strikes and current Parisian ruckus, the exhibition Frontier by Jean-Luc Meyer Abbatucci opened at Outcasts Incorporated. The essential questions and subjects of the works are those of identity, nomadism, nationality, borders and limits. It is a quest that is enriched over years of travels, where Jean-Luc Meyer Abbatucci parts in the discovery of men, far from the worldliness and privileged circles of international capitals, he crosses more borders, he meets more indigenous and tribes than museums or cultural institutions have yet opened him their doors for an exhibition.

Jean-Luc Meyer Abbatucci was born in Brazzaville, Congo in 1956. He is a graduate of les Beaux Arts in Paris and Parsons School NYC. His resume describes simply some of the major trips he made, in the context of art related projects. He lived in the « Land of the Spirits » until 1970 when, at age 14, he is confronted to a new reality: from expatriation to the full contrast of the Parisian suburbs of Saint Cloud. Jean-Luc Meyer Abbatucci brings back to France the nonchalance and story-telling skills he has inherited from his youth in Africa: a strong relationship to nature, with body and soul. He continues the adventure and meets the colonized, the expatriates, the refugees of countries at war, and tribes that have managed to survive and remain in control.  His long collaboration with Muriel Lejeune testifies, here with Evidences, of pieces elaborated in the awareness of new technology, ecological and economic disasters. It is expressed by a series of land art pieces, among which NASA photographs one in 1995. The meeting with Hugo Hebreard in India in 2001 and their collaboration beginning in 2005, leads them to form the collective « Orobouros » (the snake biting its tail). His continued involvement with information and action against pollution leads Jean Luc Abbatucci and Hugo Hebreard to create in situ, land-art/demonstrations, built with discarded materials and plastic bottles, participating, cleaning, and denunciating the ecological disasters by recycling plastics from polluted lands and oceans.  The first Orobouros pieces were made in 2006. They recently went to refugee camps as in 2015 in Vintimille where they met refugees and again in Lesbos, from where they just arrived. They proposed the refugees to transmit their messages, their names, on world maps covered by pigments and contribute to the awareness of this human catastrophe – the message, Let us cross the border signed by Amran is now in the center of this piece framed by two rolls on each side as a holy book, containing all the messages from his peers wrapped in a survival blanket. 

For this exhibition, Outcasts Incorporated continues to question the limits of art, production and collection. The goal is to push the boundaries of the exhibition of visual works in the sense of commitment and strong values ??that motivate us: here we present a selection of the flagship works of Jean-Luc as well as recent pieces: two paintings on military canvases and coated pigments, soil, sand and map collages from his travels in Israel and Pakistan.  

Most of the pieces are not for sale, as it includes traces and signatures of refugees at the border of Vintimille in 1995 or personal objects from his own family history. The works appear as relics of our times and marks this very moment of conflicts, violence and wars, without loosing hope. 

With this exhibition, Outcasts Incorporated also suggests that the artist should not be known as merely one who is present in the museums and cultural institutions, but rather should be seen as an active and sensitive man who expresses himself through an inseparable body of work / lifestyle.  Here, the exterior is brutal but the underlying essence is one of vulnerability and inspiration. We also wonder about the role of the contemporary artist in a world that dehumanizes and disintegrates into competition for status and power.  I like to remember that phrase from Bruce Nauman: "The true Artist helps the world by revealing mystical truths."

The artist as an idealist is also what is cruelly lacking in art today: a man with all his humanity. The work is on view by appointment only, or find later with Outcasts Incorporated on takeit.to

Geraldine

 

 

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