Prix Pictet: Disorder
TOURING EXHIBITION
MARCH - MAY 2017
Palau Robert, Barcelona, ES
FEBRUARY - MAY 2017
The Museum Of Photographic Arts, San Diego, CA
DECEMBER 2016 - JANUARY 2017
Kunstverein, Hamburg, DE
NOVEMBER 2016 - JANUARY 2017
The Gallery of Photography, Dublin, IE
OCTOBER 19 - 31, 2016
Bank Gallery, Tokyo, JP
APRIL - MAY 2016
LUMA Westbau, Zurich, CH
MARCH - MAY 2016
International Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum, Geneva, CH
JUNE - SEPTEMBER 2016
Municipal Gallery of Athens, Athens, GR
FEBRUARY - MARCH 2016
CAB Art Center, Brussels, BE
FEBRUARY 3 - 21, 2016
MAXXI, Rome, IT
JANUARY 5 - 17, 2016
Somerset House, London, UK
NOVEMBER - DECEMBER 2015
Musee d’Art Moderne de la Ville Paris, FR
Prix Pictet: Disorder
Our times are defined by disorder. […] Our mastery over manifold aspects of life has deluded us into thinking that we have bent the planet to our will. Yet the fragility of that assumption is exposed with each new pandemic, earthquake, tsunami or drought. With each passing day our illusion of order is shattered.”
Kofi Annan, Honorary President of the Prix Pictet.
Disorder is the theme of the sixth cycle of the prestigious Prix Pictet, which is awarded in photography and sustainability. Social chaos, political uprisings and climate disruption are all signs of the disorder that is the core focus of the works by the 12 shortlisted photographers.
Ilit Azoulay (Israel), Valérie Belin (France), Matthew Brandt (United States), Maxim Dondyuk (Ukraine), Alixandra Fazzina (United Kingdom), Ori Gersht (Israel), John Gossage (United States), Pieter Hugo (South Africa), Gideon Mendel (South Africa), Sophie Ristelhueber (France), Brent Stirton (South Africa) and Yang Yongliang (China)
A Time of Disorder
Kofi Annan
… Each of the 12 artists shortlisted for Disorder has tackled aspects of the theme in strikingly creative ways. I am struck by four examples. Maxim Dondyuk’s images of Kyiv’s Euromaidan square demonstrations in 2013/14 demand that we rethink what we thought we knew. This is the quiet genius of photography…
A Safe Distance
Elif Shafak
… In this new century, the relation between politics and art begs to be redefined. Those of us who coming from troubled and turbulent parts of the world - such as Turkey, Pakistan, Nigeria, Mexico and so on - had to come to terms with this necessity perhaps earlier than artists from well-developed democracies.
Just like philosophers, artists and writers need to take a more active role in today’s debates, but also to insist upon carving out their own space. Gone are the artificial dilemmas as to whether art should be for the masses or for art’s sake. Today’s creative souls, like birds in need of both wings to fly, cannot let go of either dimension. We must have contact with the fundamental questions that beset humankind as well as defend individual artistic freedoms and idiosyncrasies. It is a tough balance which some artists manage far better than others. In the photographs of the Ukrainian artist Maxim Dondyuk the combination of politics and aesthetics is displayed with amazing fortitude and courage. These photographs are at once familiar and unfamiliar. Here is a Ukraine we have not observed before in the world media coverage. The usage of colors and shades is spectacular. The flow of history, the forcefulness of collective identity, the militarization of the public space, and then, a single detail that whispers in our ears that there is still room for chance and hope. Crowds of police offices with their helmets and shields, mostly in hues of black and grey, confront protesters with their oranges, yellows, whites and reds. Entire cities are turned into battlegrounds, The urban space is not only militarized but also masculinist, defeminised. Disorder prevails and yet, amidst the chaos and confrontation, there is always a shaft of light, a splash of color, refusing to yield, resisting, resisting….
