Black sun

The exhibition in 7 chapters

• 1. The Petrocene [extraction]

  Just as we speak of the Anthropocene or the Capitalocene, the Petrocene marks our shift into an era in which earth, sand, soil, and rock are literally being exhausted by mass extractivism. Spanning the period from the discovery of the first oilfields in the nineteenth century to the current times of widespread collapse, the Petrocene signifies the end of landscape in the classical sense. As resources are depleted and desertification takes hold, our experience of the landscape becomes more fragmented, but also more political. To alert us to the shifting sands and other kinds of no man’s land that our petromodernity leaves in its wake, artists have adopted the practices of geologists, by collecting samples of natural resources (Michael Hirschbichler, Ismaïl Bahri, Latifa Saeed) and mapping soil depletion (Jananne Al-Ani).

  Artists exhibited:

  Jananne Al-Ani (b. 1966, Kirkuk, Iraq)
  Latif Al Ani (1932, Baghdad, Iraq–2021, Baghdad, Iraq)
  Ismaïl Bahri (b. 1978, Tunis, Tunisia)
  Bernardo Bertolucci (1941, Casarola, Italy–2018, Rome, Italy)
  Michael Hirschbichler (b. 1983, Graz, Austria)
  Latifa Saeed (b. 1985, Dubai, UAE)
  Robert Smithson (1938, Passaic, NJ, USA–1973, Amarillo, TX, USA)

• 2. Fossil fuels [combustion]

  The cosmology of oil involves a mixture of liquid and solid, of aquatic and telluric forces: in short, the political forces that permeate the airways of what Andreas Malm calls “fossil imperialism”, raising the question of the dual nature, natural and industrial, of fossil fuels and hydrocarbons. This section of the exhibition also addresses petroleum-derived products, such as plastic and tar, and their role in the colonization of nature and humanity. Whether through refineries, fossilization, or industrial accidents, various forms of combustion can shape artworks in the era of global warming — from Alberto Burri’s burnt plastics to the BP collective’s waste oil sculptures.

  Artists exhibited:

  BP (Renaud Layrac, b. 1962, Monaco; Frédéric Pohl, b. 1962, Nice; and Richard Bellon, b. 1962, Antibes, France)
  Alberto Burri (1915, Città di Castello, Italy–1995, Nice, France)
  Anita Molinero (b. 1953, Floirac, France)
  Robert Rauschenberg (1925, Port Arthur, TX, USA–2008, Captiva, FL, USA)
  Ed Ruscha (b. 1937, Omaha, NE, USA)
  Hassan Sharif (1951, Bandar Lengeh, Iran–2016, Dubai, UAE)
  Hani Zurob (b. 1976, Rafah, Palestine)

• 3. Pipeline [circulation]

  Pipelines represent the mutant body of oil infrastructure in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the ultimate system for moving hydrocarbons across the planet. Their installation — mostly underground and out of sight — transcends national boundaries and the sovereignty of states. Raised to the status of industrial icons of the petro-landscape, pipelines have become the object of numerous acts of sabotage or have fallen into ruin, rendered obsolete by the circulation of oil in tankers. They have been reappropriated many times by figures in conceptual art and minimalism, from Richard Serra to Nancy Holt, but also, recently, in the investigative art and underground artistic strategies of Rossella Biscotti.

  Artists exhibited:

  Bernd & Hilla Becher (1931, Siegen, Germany–2007, Rostock, Germany; 1934, Potsdam, Germany–2015, Düsseldorf, Germany)
  Alexandre Hogue (1898, Memphis, MO, USA–1994, Tulsa, OK, USA)
  Aref El Rayess (1928, Aley, Lebanon–2005, Aley, Lebanon)
  Monira Al Qadiri (b. 1983, Dakar, Senegal)
  Mehdi Ghadyanloo (b. 1981, Karaj, Iran)
  Zina Saro-Wiwa (b. 1976, Port Harcourt, Nigeria)
  Rossella Biscotti (b. 1978, Molfetta, Italy)
  Jumana Manna (b. 1987, Princeton, NJ, USA)
  Nancy Holt (1938, Worcester, MA, USA–2014, New York, NY, USA)

• 4. Protest [revolution]

  Black gold lies at the heart of the long history of geopolitical conflicts and state interference in oil-producing countries. The latter have responded by asserting their sovereignty through the nationalization of oil resources, labor movements, or indigenous activism. The strategies of subversion adopted by contemporary artists in confronting oil companies range from the revelatory power of documentary images (Romuald Hazoumè, Jacqueline Hassink) to the mobilizing power of sensory installations (Lungiswa Gqunta, Ana Alenso).

  Artists exhibited:

  Ana Alenso (b. 1982, Caracas, Venezuela)
  Lungiswa Gqunta (b. 1990, Port Elizabeth/Gqeberha, South Africa)
  Jacqueline Hassink (1966, Enschede, Netherlands–2018, Amsterdam, Netherlands)
  Romuald Hazoumè (b. 1962, Porto-Novo, Benin)

• 5. Petromuseum [speculation]

  Money from the oil industry has been used to fund films, festivals, and museums in countries of the Global South, as Shirin Sabahi and Alessandro Balteo-Yazbeck explain with the Tehran Museum of  Contemporary Art (TMOCA), the first “global” museum combining contemporary artists from the North and the South. Through the petromuseum, the artists also question the notions of “petrophilanthropy”, soft power, and greenwashing that are found in the countries of the North. Finally, they discuss how the museum can unwittingly become a vehicle for militant anti-oil activism, such as the actions carried out by the Stop Oil movement, to denounce “petrophilanthropy”.

  Artists exhibited:

  Alessandro Balteo-Yazbeck (b. 1972, Caracas, Venezuela)
  Fouad Elkoury (b. 1952, Paris, France)
  Media Farzin (b. 1979, San Diego, CA, USA)
  Joanne Farchakh-Bajjaly
  Shirin Sabahi (b. 1984, Tehran, Iran)
  Behjat Sadr (1924, Arak, Iran–2009, Zonza, France)

• 6. Oil spills [offshore]

  Oil spills and other industrial accidents represent the dystopian side of the oil industry, thus revealing its long-term toxicity. These phenomena, which have come to be regarded less and less as “natural” disasters, are increasingly being shown to be human, political, linked to intensive seabed drilling off the Mediterranean and African coasts. They have been extensively documented by photojournalists and documentary artists working both on land (Allan Sekula) and at sea (Isabelle Hayeur) as well as through salvage and recycling strategies (Robert Gschwantner).

  Artists exhibited:

  Robert Gschwantner (b. 1968, Steyr, Austria)
  Isabelle Hayeur (b. 1969, Montreal, Canada)
  Allan Sekula (1951, Erie, PA, USA–2013, Los Angeles, CA, USA)

• 7. Petromelancholia [burnout]

  “Petromelancholia”, as researcher Stephanie LeMenager conceives it, primarily denotes a process of mourning in response to a modernity that has proved to be more of a destructive force than a source of progress. Similar to solastalgia (a feeling of distress at the degradation of the planet), “petromelancholia” also represents an impetus to environmental activism and an imaginative ability to move toward a post-oil society. Faced with the gradual disappearance of biodiversity, artists exorcise toxic landscapes (Linda Lamignan) by reviving resilient, even renascent, fauna and flora (Anahita Norouzi, Jala Wahid). They question the conditions of existence for works of art in the era of global warming.

  Artists exhibited:

  Chloe Dewe Mathews (b. 1982, London, UK)
  Linda Lamignan (b. 1988, Stavanger, Norway)
  Anahita Norouzi (b. 1983, Tehran, Iran)
  Jessica Segall (b. 1978, Murphysboro, IL, USA)
  Jala Wahid (b. 1988, London, UK)