Claire Fontaine

Artist

Claire Fontaine is a feminist and conceptual artist created in Paris in 2004 by Fulvia Carnevale and James Thornhill, an Italian-British duo who present themselves as her assistants. Since 2018, Claire Fontaine has lived and worked in Palermo, maintaining a studio in the historic Kalsa district.

Claire Fontaine defines a space where the artists’ biographies are not directly connected to their works, allowing their research to become a space of freedom and desubjectivization. The use of appropriation and hijacking in her work stems from the same intention: not to highlight the excellence of the artist’s unique singularity, but to activate the forms and forces within our visual culture, emphasizing their political content. She published with Diversity of Aesthetics a conversation with Iman Ganji and José Rosales titled Foreigners Everywhere in 2022, a comprehensive anthology of her writings with Semiotext(e) in 2020 titled Human Strike and the Art of Creating Freedom, the artist books Some Instructions for the Sharing of Private Property with One Star Press in 2011 and Living, Winning with Dilecta in 2009. Two monographs on the artist have been published by Koenig’s Books: Newsfloor in 2020, with texts by Anita Chari and Jaleh Mansoor, and Foreigners Everywhere in 2011, with texts by Letizia Ragaglia, Bernard Blistène, Nicolas Liucci-Goutnikov, John Kelsey, and Hal Foster. The first critical essay entirely dedicated to the artist, Claire Fontaine, a User’s Manual by Anita Chari, is published by Lenz Press in 2024. The title of the 60th Venice Biennale in 2024, Foreigners Everywhere, is derived from an ongoing work by Claire Fontaine. Adriano Pedrosa, the biennale’s curator, was inspired by the artist’s neon series, stating in a press conference: “The backdrop for the work is a world filled with crises and multifaceted challenges related to people’s movement and existence across countries, nations, territories, and borders, reflecting the dangers and obstacles of language, translation, nationality, the expression of differences, and disparities conditioned by identity, race, gender, sexuality, freedom, and human development.”

Recent solo exhibitions include: Manifesta 15, Barcelona (2024), Speechless, Bar project, Barcelona (2024) Beauty is a Ready-Made, Fondation Hermès, Seoul (2024); La mer à boire, Mudam, Luxembourg (2024); Star Reply Forward Copy Info Delete, Memphis, Linz (2022); Siamo con voi nella notte, Museo del 900, Florence (2020); I-WE-YES, Studio Concreto, Lecce (2020); Your Money and Your Life, Galerias Municipais, Lisbon (2019); La Borsa e la vita, Palazzo Ducale, Genoa (2019); Les printemps seront silencieux, Le Confort Moderne, Poitiers (2019); #displaced, Städtische Galerie Nordhorn, Nordhorn (2019); Fortezzuola, Museo Pietro Canonica, Villa Medici, Rome (2016); Tears, Jewish Museum, New York (2013); 1493, Espacio 1414, San Juan, Puerto Rico (2013); Sell Your Debt, Queen’s Nails, San Francisco (2013); Redemptions, CCA Wattis, San Francisco (2013); Carelessness causes fire, Audian Gallery, Vancouver (2012); Breakfast starts at midnight, Index, The Swedish Contemporary Art Foundation, Stockholm (2012); M-A-C-C-H-I-N-A-Z-IO-N-I, Museion, Bolzano (2012); P.I.G.S., MUSAC, Castilla y León (2011); Economie, Museum of Contemporary Art, North Miami (2010).