Laurent Grasso (born 1972) is a French conceptual artist living and working in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

Biography

Laurent Grasso is the recipient of the esteemed

Order of Arts and Letters The Order of Arts and Letters () is an order of France established on 2 May 1957 by the Minister of Culture. Its supplementary status to the was confirmed by President Charles de Gaulle in 1963. Its purpose is the recognition of significant ...

by the French Ministry of Culture and the prestigious

Marcel Duchamp Prize The Marcel Duchamp Prize (in French : ''Prix Marcel Duchamp'') is an annual award given to a young artist by the Association pour la Diffusion Internationale de l'Art Français (ADIAF). The winner receives €35,000 personally and up to €30,000 ...

in 2015, and 2008 respectively. Currently based in Paris, he has held residencies at the

Villa Medici The Villa Medici () is a sixteenth-century Italian Mannerist villa and an architectural complex with 7-hectare Italian garden, contiguous with the more extensive Borghese gardens, on the Pincian Hill next to Trinità dei Monti in the historic ...

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

and ISCP,

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

. In 2015, Grasso was solicited by the

French National Archives The Archives nationales (; abbreviated AN; English: National Archives) are the national archives of France. They preserve the archives of the French state, apart from the archives of the Ministry of Armed Forces and Ministry of Foreign Affairs ...

to create a film on the

aesthetics Aesthetics (also spelled esthetics) is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature of beauty and taste (sociology), taste, which in a broad sense incorporates the philosophy of art.Slater, B. H.Aesthetics ''Internet Encyclopedia of Ph ...

of power and its agents. The resulting work ‘Élysée’, set in the French Presidential office’s Salon Doré to the soundtrack created by

Nicolas Godin Nicolas Godin (born 25 December 1969) is a French musician best known for being one half of the music duo Air. Early life Godin was born in Paris, Île-de-France, France, and studied architecture at the École Nationale Supérieure d'Architectu ...

, debuted in

Edouard Malingue Gallery Kiang Malingue is a commercial art gallery with premises in Hong Kong and New York City. It was founded by Edouard Malingue and Lorraine Kiang Malingue as the Edouard Malingue Gallery in 2010. The establishment combines different disciplines, ra ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

in March 2016. Since then it has since been broadcast in

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

on numerous occasions, including the Nuit européenne des musées 2016. Grasso’s work has been exhibited worldwide, notably at the

Jeu de Paume ''Jeu de paume'' (, ; originally spelled ; ), nowadays known as real tennis, (US) court tennis or (in France) ''courte paume'', is a ball-and-court game that originated in France. It was an indoor precursor of tennis played without racquets, ...

, Paris;

MASS MoCa The Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA) is a museum in a converted Arnold Print Works factory building complex located in North Adams, Massachusetts. It is one of the largest centers for contemporary visual art and performing ...

, North Adams;

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 ...

, amongst others, and is held in

collections Collection or Collections may refer to: Computing * Collection (abstract data type), the abstract concept of collections in computer science * Collection (linking), the act of linkage editing in computing * Garbage collection (computing), autom ...

such as the

Centre Pompidou The Centre Pompidou (), more fully the (), also known as the Pompidou Centre in English and colloquially as Beaubourg, is a building complex in Paris, France. It was designed in the style of high-tech architecture by the architectural team of ...

, Paris;

Mori Art Museum The is a contemporary art museum founded by the real estate developer Minoru Mori. It is located in the Roppongi Hills Mori Tower in the Roppongi Hills complex, a commercial, cultural, and residential mega-complex in Tokyo, Japan. The museum's ...

Tokyo Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

and Leeum Samsung Museum,

Seoul Seoul, officially Seoul Special Metropolitan City, is the capital city, capital and largest city of South Korea. The broader Seoul Metropolitan Area, encompassing Seoul, Gyeonggi Province and Incheon, emerged as the world's List of cities b ...

. It has also been featured in multiple publications including ‘Architecture Now’ (Taschen).

Work

Laurent Grasso’s practice engages deeply with science, history,

mythology Myth is a genre of folklore consisting primarily of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society. For scholars, this is very different from the vernacular usage of the term "myth" that refers to a belief that is not true. Instead, the ...

and

supernatural Supernatural phenomena or entities are those beyond the Scientific law, laws of nature. The term is derived from Medieval Latin , from Latin 'above, beyond, outside of' + 'nature'. Although the corollary term "nature" has had multiple meanin ...

phenomena to weave a research-filled narrative. Tending on the

epistemological Epistemology is the branch of philosophy that examines the nature, origin, and limits of knowledge. Also called "the theory of knowledge", it explores different types of knowledge, such as propositional knowledge about facts, practical knowled ...

, Grasso works across different disciplines from film and installation to painting and

neon Neon is a chemical element; it has symbol Ne and atomic number 10. It is the second noble gas in the periodic table. Neon is a colorless, odorless, inert monatomic gas under standard conditions, with approximately two-thirds the density of ...

. Major public installations include ‘Nomiya’ (2009–2011), a transportable restaurant sat on the roof of the

Palais de Tokyo The Palais de Tokyo (''Tokyo Palace'') is a building dedicated to modern and contemporary art, located at 13 avenue du Président-Wilson, facing the Trocadéro, in the 16th arrondissement of Paris. The eastern wing of the building belongs to ...

in Paris; ‘Anechoic Pavilion’ (2012), an installation presented by Edouard Malingue Gallery atop Central Ferry Pier 4 in Hong Kong. ‘SolarWind’, a permanent light installation in Paris commissioned by the 13th district council, Ciments Calcia and SEMAPA in collaboration with the Space Observatory and the National Centre for Space Studies’, which projects the colour fluctuations of solar storms onto the walls of two 40 meter Calcia silos bordering the capital’s 13 district. His most notable solo exhibitions in recent years include ‘PARAMUSEUM’ (2016) at Palais Fesch, Ajaccio, ‘Élysée’ (2016) in Edouard Malingue Gallery, Hong Kong and ‘Soleil Noir’ (2015) at the Foundation d’entreprise Hermès, Tokyo.

Bibliography

* ''Laurent Grasso – Le rayonnement du corps noir '', Dijon, Les presses du réel, 2009 * ''Laurent Grasso – The Black-Body Radiation'' (English edition), Dijon, Les presses du réel, 2009 * ''Laurent Grasso – The Horn Perspective'', Paris, Centre Pompidou editions, 2009 * ''Laurent Grasso – Uraniborg'', Jeu de Paume, Paris; Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal; Skira Flammarion, 2012 * ''Laurent Grasso – Future Archeology'', Edouard Malingue Gallery, Hong Kong, 2012

References

External links

*
Vidéo
« Laurent Grasso talks about his installation ''du soleil dans la nuit'' »
Nomiya
an architectural project on the rooftop of the Palais de Tokyo in Paris
Article on the exhibition at the "Espace 315" of the Centre Pompidou
for the Marcel Duchamp Prize
Laurent Grasso - Portrait of a Young Man
Bass Museum, Miami FL
Edouard Malingue Gallery
Hong Kong gallery representing Laurent Grasso {{DEFAULTSORT:Grasso, Laurent 1972 births Living people Artists from Mulhouse French contemporary artists French people of Italian descent