TAKEN APART & PUT BACK TOGETHER AGAIN
January 31 – April 21, 2024

ANGELA DETANICO & RAFAEL LAIN
AURÉLIEN FROMENT
CLAIRE HARVEY
DAVID HORVITZ
DOUGLAS GORDON
FRANCIS ALŸS
GIORGIO ANDREOTTA CALÒ
JIMMY ROBERT
JULIEN DISCRIT
KATINKA BOCK
KOSMAS NIKOLAOU
LAWRENCE WEINER
MARIO GARCÍA TORRES
MOUNIR FATMI
OSCAR SANTILLÁN
PAUL MPAGI SEPUYA
PAULINE BOUDRY & RENATE LORENZ
SHILPA GUPTA
VITTORIO SANTORO
WILFREDO PRIETO

curated by NATHALIE ZONNENBERG

The exhibition TAKEN APART & PUT BACK TOGETHER AGAIN marks the fourth edition of an annual collaboration between A Tale of A Tub and Tlön Projects and presents a variety of artworks selected from Tlön Projects’ imaginary collection. The title of the exhibition, curated by guest curator Nathalie Zonnenberg, is derived from a statement by the American artist Lawrence Weiner (1942-2021). As the motto of the exhibition, it refers to the existence of conceptual artworks in collections, which often disintegrate after their initial presentation and need to be rebuilt to be seen again.

The exhibition brings together sets of artworks which (originally) formed a whole, like twins separated after birth being brought back together after some time. These twin works or ‘doubles’ are parts of the same work or closely related works by the same artist, or sometimes they are works by different artists that share conceptual meaning or topics. The works come from different collections, revealing corresponding choices in their composition and reversing the circle of production, distribution and collection.

The exhibition is structured as a journey of discovery in which visitors can link the twin works together, similar to the Memory game, yet slightly different. It represents several principles of the history of a comprehensive, ‘encyclopedic’ collection. It can be understood as a microcosm of the macrocosm, in which there are various references to the world in which we live, our actions in it, but also far beyond it, by reading the position of the sun, moon and stars. Routes of kinship are explored between concealment and publicity, reality and myth, day and night, Orient and Occident, and North and South.

The imaginary collection is formed by the convergence of selected artworks from various international private art collections and constitutes the starting point for its programme, which is created in collaboration with various partner institutions. In this way, Tlön Projects generates access to artworks which otherwise would have been largely shielded from public access.

The works selected for TAKEN APART & PUT BACK TOGETHER AGAIN were taken from the following collections: Lorraine Janet Dean & Nigel Bagley Collection (Netherlands), Kervahut-Laurent Fiévet Collection (France), Frédéric de Goldschmidt Collection (Belgium), Fondazione In Between Art Film (Italy), Joseph Kouli Collection (France), Lab’Bel Collection (France), Collection Edgard F. Grima, (France) ), Kerenidis Pepe Collection (France), Terry Rocvès Collection (France), Servais Family Collection (Belgium), Veys-Verhaevert Collection (Belgium), together with other collections that wish to remain anonymous.