The Frac Lorraine, also known as 49 Nord 6 Est, is a public collection of

contemporary art Contemporary art is a term used to describe the art of today, generally referring to art produced from the 1970s onwards. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a ...

of the

Grand Est Grand Est (; ) is an Regions of France, administrative region in northeastern France. It superseded three former administrative regions, Alsace, Champagne-Ardenne and Lorraine, on 1 January 2016 under the provisional name of Alsace-Champagne-A ...

region in France. It is located in

Metz Metz ( , , , then ) is a city in northeast France located at the confluence of the Moselle (river), Moselle and the Seille (Moselle), Seille rivers. Metz is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Moselle (department), Moselle Departments ...

History

Regional collections of contemporary art (Fracs) were created in 1982 by the French

Minister of Culture A culture minister or a heritage minister is a common cabinet position in governments. The culture minister is typically responsible for cultural policy, which often includes arts policy (direct and indirect support to artists and arts organiza ...

to disseminate contemporary art within each region of France. Set up within the political context of

decentralization Decentralization or decentralisation is the process by which the activities of an organization, particularly those related to planning and decision-making, are distributed or delegated away from a central, authoritative location or group and gi ...

, Fracs were established on the principle that financing would be shared between the state and the regional councils. Fracs have three complementary missions: to collect the contemporary art of local, as well as, international artists, to take art out into a broad public, and to educate people about arts. The Frac Lorraine was founded in 1984 as a nomad contemporary art fund. Since 2004, it seats in the Saint-Livier Hôtel, an

hôtel particulier () is the French term for a grand urban mansion, comparable to a Townhouse (Great Britain), British townhouse. Whereas an ordinary (house) was built as part of a row, sharing party walls with the houses on either side and directly fronting on a ...

of the 12th century in the historical centre of

. Since then, the Frac Lorraine has been nicknamed ''49 Nord 6 Est'' (), because of the

geodesic In geometry, a geodesic () is a curve representing in some sense the locally shortest path ( arc) between two points in a surface, or more generally in a Riemannian manifold. The term also has meaning in any differentiable manifold with a conn ...

of the Hôtel.

Cultural policy

The Frac Lorraine has an ongoing exhibition schedule, welcoming guest contemporary artists, as well as, those from other disciplines, and engaged in publishing activities and educational initiatives. The Frac Lorraine has developed over the years a network of partners, such as the fine arts museums of

Lorraine Lorraine, also , ; ; Lorrain: ''Louréne''; Lorraine Franconian: ''Lottringe''; ; ; is a cultural and historical region in Eastern France, now located in the administrative region of Grand Est. Its name stems from the medieval kingdom of ...

, the regional art centers and municipal spaces, historic monuments and parks, and the

University of Lorraine The University of Lorraine (), abbreviated as UL, is a public research university based in Lorraine, Grand Est region, France. It was created on 1 January 2012, by the merger of Henri Poincaré University, Nancy 2 University, Paul Verlaine Un ...

. For example, the Frac Lorraine has organized in 2012 an exhibition entitled ''Frac Forever'' in joint initiative with the

Centre Pompidou-Metz The Centre Pompidou-Metz is a museum of modern and contemporary art located in Metz, capital of Lorraine, France. It is a branch of Pompidou arts centre of Paris, and features semi-permanent and temporary exhibitions from the large collection ...

. The Frac Lorraine has a documentation center on

and frequently organizes conferences.

Contemporary art collection

The Frac Lorraine collection encompasses over 800 art works from more than 300 regional, national, and international artists, including

Lida Abdul Lidā Abdul (; née Lidā Abdullah, ; born 1973), is an American-Afghan-born video artist and performance artist. She was born as Lida Abdullah in Kabul in 1979 and fled the country as a child during the Soviet Invasion. She went on to live in In ...

Marina Abramović Marina Abramović ( sr-Cyrl, Марина Абрамовић, ; born November 30, 1946) is a Serbian conceptual and performance artist. Her work explores body art, endurance art, the relationship between the performer and audience, the limit ...

Daniel Buren Daniel Buren (born 25 March 1938, in Boulogne-Billancourt) is a French conceptual artist, painter, and sculptor. He has won numerous awards including the Golden Lion for best pavilion at the Venice Biennale (1986), the International Award for ...

Luis Camnitzer Luis Camnitzer (born November 6, 1937) is a Germany, German-born Uruguayan artist, curator, art critic, and academic who was at the forefront of 1960s Conceptual Art. Camnitzer works primarily in sculpture, printmaking, and installation, explorin ...

Esther Ferrer Esther Ferrer (born 1937 in San Sebastián, Spain) is a Spanish performance artist. Ferrer received Spain's National Award for Plastic Arts (1999), the Marie-Claire Prize for Contemporary Art in France, and the Velázquez Plastic Arts Prize. ...

Dora García Dora García (born 1965) is a contemporary Spanish artist. García draws on interactivity and performance in her work, using the exhibition space as a platform to investigate the relationship between artwork, audience, and place. García transfor ...

Luigi Ghirri Luigi Ghirri (5 January 1943 – 14 February 1992) was an Italian artist and photographer whose work was about the relationship between fiction and reality. Ghirri has been the subject of numerous books. His works are held by various museums around ...

Joan Jonas Joan Jonas (born July 13, 1936) is an American visual artist and a pioneer of video and performance art, "a central figure in the performance art movement of the late 1960s".Nicholas Nixon,

Cornelia Parker Cornelia Ann Parker (born 14 July 1956) is an English visual artist, best known for her sculpture and installation art. Life and career Parker was born in 1956 in Cheshire, England. She studied at the Gloucestershire College of Art and Design ...

Hito Steyerl Hito Steyerl (born 1 January 1966) is a German filmmaker, moving image visual artist, artist, writer, and innovator of the essay documentary.Hiroshi Sugimoto is a Japanese photographer and architect. He leads the Tokyo-based architectural firm New Material Research Laboratory. Early life and education Hiroshi Sugimoto was born and raised in Tokyo, Japan. He reportedly took his earliest photographs ...

Niele Toroni Niele Toroni (born 15 March 1937 in Muralto) is a Swiss painter. He lives and works in Paris. Work In 1966 Toroni started a practice he calls "Travail-Peinture". Toroni's method, brushstrokes made with imprints of a no. 50 paintbrush repeated a ...

, and

Wolf Vostell Wolf Vostell (14 October 1932 – 3 April 1998) was a German painter and sculptor, considered one of the early adopters of video art and installation art and pioneer of Happenings and Fluxus. Techniques such as blurring and Dé-coll/age are ...

References

{{Portal bar, Visual arts FRAC collections Contemporary art galleries in France Buildings and structures in Metz Architecture in Metz Museums in Moselle (department) Tourist attractions in Metz