Douglas Gordon and Philippe Parreno are going to carry on the new art vogue: Spoart (sport + art). The Scottish artist - who won both the Turner Prize and the Hugo Boss Prize - and his French colleague - truly a master of collaborations - are currently preparing the sequel of the 2006 masterpiece Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait.
This video, three years in the making, could be said to have inspired a series of events between art and sports like Deep Play, a video installation by Czech Republic-born Berlin-based filmmaker Harun Farocki devoted to the last World Cup final match and which premiered at the last Documenta. The Farocki project was collaborated on together by MACBA Barcelona, DFB Kulturstiftung Berlin, and FIFA. Deep Play is going to be presented at GreeneNaftali Gallery in New York on January 10.
The new Gordon-Parreno project will feature José Tomás, the most famous matador in Spain. Tomás returned to the ring after five years of unofficial retirement that began in September 2002 without explanation. His comeback took place on June 17 at the Monumental of Barcelona confirming himself as one of the greatest toreros on the planet. As reported by The Times' Mike Wade, Gordon -- who attended the bullfight -- said: "it was the most astonishing bullfight I'd ever seen. He is an amazing character who has obviously gone against the grain in that very machoculture, and Philippe and I are very interested in him as a matador. But we can also see things from the point of view of the animal, this beautiful beast."
Great expectations attend the launch of this new effort. Zidane was premiered at Cannes; consequently it was played during Art Basel at the St. Jacob Stadium - designed by artists' frequent collaborator Herzog & De Meuron - and then at the Sandretto Re Rebaudengo Foundation in Turin, which co-produced the video, which is already part of both the MoMA and Guggenheim collection. The Turin screening was held at the prestigious Carignano Theatre and accompanied by a press conference conducted by foundation director Francesco Bonami — who co-organized in 2006 the sport culture survey "Human Game" at Pitti Immagine in Florence - and several soccer journalists.
While Parreno's last solo show closed last November at the Berlin leading gallery Esther Schipper, Douglas Gordon seems to be more and more concentrated on other aspects of his carrier. The artist - who presented his ongoing self-reflective project Pretty Much Everything about Douglas Gordon at the SFMOMA (an artist talk is scheduled on January 10) - has been recently appointed food-and-drink editor at French Playboy magazine. He is also going to opena non-profit art space in Glasgow with friend and former Dundee Contemporary Arts director Katrina Brown. (Brown founded in 2006 The Common Guild, a visual artorganization based in Glasgow.) Anna Gaskell (Gordon's ex-girlfriend) is supposed to be the artist who will inaugurate this Gordon new initiative.
Nicola Trezzi
