A presentation of two “Before publications” was organized at the CEC on Thursday, May 25, 2023, in collaboration with Joyfully Waiting, a sound project by Nathalie Rebholz. It brought together Laurence Bonvin (artist, photographer, and filmmaker, born 1967 in Sierre), whose publication, شالي (shali). Before publication 7, was edited in 2022, and Yann Chateigné Tytelman (freelance writer and curator, born 1977 in Brussels) whose publication, Blackout. Before publication 10, was launching on the event. The event created space for discussion about the various themes addressed by the two speakers, in conversation with Véronique Bacchetta. Both talked about the development of his or her “Before publication”, as well as her artistic practice, in the case of Laurence Bonvin, and his curatorial practice, in the case of Yann Chateigné Tytelman.
An interlude by RM, Dirty dirty desire, 2023, track by Pony Pride, released on activeRat, followed the presentation of the two publications. The evening concluded with a listening session of Joyfully Waiting.
Starting in 2019, the CEC launches into the “Before publication” collection. It gathers several authors’ texts or artists’ inserts, which appear regularly and until the final edition of L’Effet papillon, 2008-2024, the second volume of the Centre d’édition contemporaine’s retrospective catalog, L’Effet papillon, 1989-2007 (published in 2008).
Laurence Bonvin, شالي. Before publication 7, 36 pages, ed. of the CEC, 2022
The set of photographs Shali (house in Siwi language) was made in February 2021 – Shali, digital photographs (color originals), inkjet print on Hahnmühle paper, 74.7 x 58 cm, 2021. It’s related to the fortress of the same name, located in the center of the Siwa oasis in Egypt. The construction technique, kershef, is a mixture of clay, salt, and stones. It is exemplary of Berber vernacular architecture and offers a natural protection against the heat of the desert. Severely eroded by time and the torrential rains of 1926, the fortress of Shali has been restored by the Egyptian government who wants to make Siwa an eco-tourism center.
Born in 1967 in Sierre, Laurence Bonvin is a Swiss photographer and film director. She lives between Switzerland and the city of Lisbon. Marked by the documentary, her approach has been focused for many years on landscape, architecture, and the phenomena of transformation of urban and natural environments. Through her gaze, the artist reveals the social, poetic and political dimensions of intermediate places such as borders, wastelands, pre-urban and peri-urban areas, and questions their identities. Her photographic work has been presented in solo exhibitions including: Blackrock, Dak’Art Biennale, Dakar (2022); Earth Beats, Kunsthaus Zürich (2021); See Pieces, Alfred Ehrhardt Foundation, Berlin (2021); Les lois de l’improbabilité, Centre de la photographie, Geneva (2020); Something Else 2, Biennale off, Darb 1789, Cairo (2018); Flow of Forms, Museum of Ethnology, Hamburg (2018). She also participates in the collective exhibition, La montagne en perspective, in the Museum of Art and History, Geneva (2022-23). Laurence Bonvin has directed several short films presented in exhibitions as well as selected by international festivals such as Ghost Fair Trade (2022). She has benefited from a Pro Helvetia Cairo workshop between 2020 and 2021.
Yann Chateigné Tytelman, Blackout. Before publication 10, 44 pages, ed. of the CEC, 2023
“It all started with a letter to my father. It had been about ten years since his death, and I suddenly felt like writing to him about the silence, his silence, the silence between us. It started in 2020, as a necessity. The silence, then, was striking. It resonated with other erased voices, other voids, other emotions. I thought I would not be able to stop. Neither diary, nor essay, nor short story, Blackout is a weaving, a braid made of these lines of silence, and tells, in fragments, the story of a dispossession, of an entry into darkness.”
(Yann Chateigné Tytelman, Blackout. Before publication 10, extract from the colophon)
Yann Chateigné Tytelman is an author and curator living in Brussels. He was an artistic advisor at MORPHO, Antwerp; curator at KANAL – Centre Pompidou, Brussels (2019–2021); head of the Visual Arts Department at HEAD – Geneva (2009-2017) and of the programming at CAPC Museum of contemporary art in Bordeaux (2007–2009). He recently organized Four Sisters (Jewish Museum of Belgium, Brussels, 2023), A Glittering Ruin Sucked Upwards (HISK, Brussels, 2022), Gordon Matta-Clark: Material Thinking (Canadian Center for Architecture, Montreal and Museum der Moderne, Salzburg, 2019-2021) and By repetition, you start noticing details in the landscape (Le Commun, Geneva, 2019). He has contributed to Conceptual Fine Arts, Mousse and Spike and co-edited Almanac Ecart. A collective archive, 1969-2019 (HEAD-Geneva/ art&fiction, 2019).
This project is sponsored by the City of Geneva, and by the Federal Office of Culture and the Republic and the Canton of Geneva.
