Laurent Didier Mercier (born 1967) is a French artist, producer and director. He spent several years as an independent multimedia artist, organizing collective exhibitions, and analyzing the condition and status of artists in society. He worked with the publishing firm, Association for the Development of Multimedia Literature. He heads a production studio and 3D school 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 ...

Early life

Laurent Mercier was born in France in 1967. He spent part of his childhood on the roads with his parents who worked in the music industry. Later he studied at the

Ecole nationale supérieure des Beaux-arts The (), formally the (), is a French ''grande école'' whose primary mission is to provide high-level fine arts education and training. The art school, which is part of the Paris Sciences et Lettres University, is located on two sites: Saint-G ...

in Paris. His teachers were , Christian Boltansky,

Annette Messager Annette Messager (born 30 November 1943) is a French visual artist. She is known for championing the techniques and materials of outsider art. In 2005, she won the Golden Lion Award at the Venice Biennale for her artwork at the French pavilion, F ...

, , and Michel Salsman.

Career

His artistic approach is characterized by the wild displaying of his artwork. He exhibited regularly at the Galerie Donguy, rue de la Roquette in Paris. This gallery represented the

Fluxus movement Fluxus was an international, interdisciplinary community of artists, composers, designers, and poets during the 1960s and 1970s who engaged in experimental performance art, art performances which emphasized the artistic process over the finishe ...

(

John Cage John Milton Cage Jr. (September 5, 1912 – August 12, 1992) was an American composer and music theorist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and Extended technique, non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one ...

La Monte Young La Monte Thornton Young (born October 14, 1935) is an American composer, musician, and performance artist recognized as one of the first American minimalist composers and a central figure in Fluxus and post-war avant-garde music. He is best k ...

Yoko Ono Yoko Ono (, usually spelled in katakana as ; born February 18, 1933) is a Japanese multimedia artist, singer, songwriter, and peace activist. Her work also encompasses performance art and filmmaking. Ono grew up in Tokyo and moved to New York ...

Joseph Beuys Joseph Heinrich Beuys ( ; ; 12 May 1921 – 23 January 1986) was a German artist, teacher, performance artist, and Aesthetics, art theorist whose work reflected concepts of humanism and sociology. With Heinrich Böll, , Caroline Tisdall, Rober ...

) and

Body art Body art is art in which the artist uses their human body as the primary medium.Oxford Dictionary of Modern and Contemporary Art, Oxford University, p. 88 Emerging from the context of Conceptual Art during the 1970s, Body art may include performanc ...

. After Michel Journiac's passing, he continued the collective "Image pour vivre" and organized several exhibitions at Galerie Donguy. Mercier and Jacques Donguy developed many events on the subject of the artist's condition and status in society. They became the subject of protests on radio, university and in

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...

congress. He joined Jeans François Bory and Donguy in publishing 'Association for the Development of Multimedia Literature', an international magazine for Europe, US, Brazil and Japan that releases poetry anthologies and documents, reissues rare discs and vocal music. Mercier performed with Donguy at the Centre National Georges Pompidou in Paris. At the same time he taught Visual Arts at the Jail Maison Central de Poissy. Mercier created "Studio Mercier" to train computer graphics artists working in international production studios. He created his own production studio Callicore as a resistance act against "the cultural dictatorship of media". They won a

Webby Award The Webby Awards (colloquially referred to as the Webbys) are awards for excellence on the Internet presented annually by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, a judging body composed of over three thousand industry experts a ...

with John Lee Hooker Jr. for the animated music video "Blues ain't nothin' but a Pimp" and enlarged Callicore's skills with music publishing. Artists co-produced by Mercier include

Iggy Pop James Newell Osterberg Jr. (born April 21, 1947), known professionally as Iggy Pop, is an American singer, musician, songwriter, actor and radio broadcaster. He was the vocalist and lyricist of proto-punk band the Stooges, who were formed in 1 ...

Johnny Winter John Dawson Winter III (February 23, 1944 – July 16, 2014) was an American singer, guitarist, songwriter, and record producer. Winter was known for his high-energy blues rock albums, live performances, and slide guitar playing from the late 1 ...

, John Lee Hooker Jr,

Arrested Development ''Arrested Development'' is an American satire, satirical television sitcom created by Mitchell Hurwitz. It follows the Bluths, a formerly wealthy, dysfunctional family and is presented in a Serial (radio and television), serialized format, inco ...

, Carbon Silicon,

The Buzzcocks Buzzcocks are an English punk rock band that singer-songwriter-guitarist Pete Shelley and singer-songwriter Howard Devoto formed in Manchester in 1976. During their career, the band combined elements of punk rock, power pop, and pop punk. They ...

The Meteors The Meteors are an English psychobilly band formed in 1980. Originally from London, England, they are one of the pioneers of the psychobilly subgenre — which fuses punk rock with rockabilly — its distinctive sound and style. "Starting in t ...

, The Washington Dead Cats,

Marky Ramone Marc Steven Bell (born July 15, 1952), better known as Marky Ramone, is an American drummer. He began playing in hard rock bands in the New York City area, notably Dust (band), Dust and Estus. He was asked to drum for punk rock band Richard Hell ...

, We Are the Fury,

CAKE Cake is a flour confection usually made from flour, sugar, and other ingredients and is usually baked. In their oldest forms, cakes were modifications of bread, but cakes now cover a wide range of preparations that can be simple or elabor ...

Brian Setzer Brian Robert Setzer (born April 10, 1959) is an American guitarist, singer, and songwriter. He found widespread success in the early 1980s with the 1950s-style rockabilly group Stray Cats, and returned to the music scene in the early 1990s with ...

Lee Rocker Leon Drucker (born August 3, 1961), professionally known as Lee Rocker is an American musician. He is a member of the rockabilly band Stray Cats. He is the son of the classical clarinetists Stanley Drucker, the late former principal clarinet ...

and

Popa Chubby Popa Chubby, (pronounced POP'-uh) stage name of Theodore Joseph "Ted" Horowitz (born March 31, 1960, in The Bronx, New York City, New York), is an American singer, composer, and guitarist. Life and career At age thirteen Horowitz began playin ...

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Mercier, Laurent 1967 births Living people 21st-century French male artists 20th-century French male artists Place of birth missing (living people) French producers French directors