THE SAVED BOLTANSKIES

THE SAVED BOLTANSKIES

THE SAVED BOLTANSKIES is a series of artwork posters by Christian Boltanski saved by artist Thierry Geoffroy / COLONEL. In 2000, the French artist Christian Boltanski had a solo exhibition in ARKEN Museum of Modern Art in Denmark. In addition to the exhibiting in the museum space, Christian Boltanski chooses also to involve the public space by requesting that the posters from the archive project Menschlich should be put in the streets of Copenhagen. Menschlich is a collection of photographic images taken from found photo albums and police archives showing persons of all ages, genders, backgrounds, religions, social statuses and nationalities. There is no classification in Menschlich, and the portraits are presented as anonymous images of individuals without distinguishing criminals from victims. The posters were on display in the streets of Copenhagen and would have been covered up by advertising posters if Thierry Geoffroy / COLONEL did not save them. He almost managed to remove and save all the posters and THE SAVED BOLTANSKIES consists today of more than 100 artworks from which some have been brought back to safe museum spaces in exhibitions such as Media Transport in Sprengel Museum, Hannover.

“The collection THE SAVED BOLTANSKIES questions the circulation of the artwork in different contexts, how an image travels and takes different lives” says Thierry Geoffroy / COLONEL. “It is about how a photo from a family album becomes an artwork and how a museum artwork becomes a street artwork and how a street artwork travels back to the comfortable space of a museum or a home of a collector.” Today the artworks from the series THE SAVED BOLTANSKIES can be found in the collection of HEART-Herning Museum of Contemporary Art and The National Museum of Photography in Denmark as well as in private collections.

Tijana Mišković / Gallery Ultracontemporaine

Media Transport Sprengel Museum, Hannover 2002Installation viewTHE SAVED BOLTANSKIES was exhibited in the museum interfering with artworks from the collection. Images are from the rooms dedicated respectively to Fernand Lége and Pablo Picasso

85 x 100 cm 75 x 87 cm

112 x 99 cm

196 x 88 cm

145 x 85 cm

64 x 82 cm 64 x 85 cm

100 x 83 cm

84 x 83 cm 82 x 75 cm

84 x 108 cm 65 x 83 cm

84 x 64 cm 67 x 68 cm

103 x 67 cm

81 x 54 cm

81 x 54 cm 64 x 82 cm

63 x 88 cm 64 x 89 cm

69 x 82 cm 64 x 88 cm

64 x 82 cm 59 x 82 cm

62 x 82 cm 60 x 88 cm

125 x 160 cm 72 x 82 cm

127 x 102 cm

65 x 84 cm 59 x 75 cm

64 x 52 cm

44 x 62 cm 48 x 85 cm

182 x 82 cm

64 x 82 cm 64 x 82 cm

61 x 82 cm 64 x 82 cm

64 x 83 cm 64 x 89 cm

60 x 86 cm 65 x 82 cm

166 x 83 cm

Thierry Geoffroy / COLONELBorn 1961www.colonel.dk

Thierry Geoffroy, also known as COLONEL, is a French artist, living in Copenhagen, Denmark.

He is a format artist developing art formats, most known being EMERGENCY ROOM, BIENNALIST and CRITICAL RUN.

Thierry Geoffroy / COLONEL has published 6 books and his artwork s are are included in international museum collections.

He is Chevalier de l’ordre des Arts et des Lettres.

SELECTED GROUP AND ONE-MAN SHOWS FROM 2007 - 2015P.S.1/ MOMA New York, USA; ZKM Museum Karlsruhe, DE; Sprengel Museum, Hannover, DE; Moderna Museet, the Museum of Modern Art, Stockholm, SE; HEART- HerningMuseum of Contemporary Art Denmark, Herning, DK; Plazzo Delle Arti Napoli, IT; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Roskilde, DK; Galerie Asbaek Copenhagen, DK; The Maldives Pavilion, Venice Biennale, Venice, IT; Liverpool Biennial, Liverpool, UK, Manifesta Biennal, Murcia, ES; National Museum Rejkavik, FI; Galerie Olaf Stüber, Berlin, DE, IKM Museum, Oslo, NO; Fries Museum, Leeuwarden, NL; De-vron Arts, Huntly, Aberdeenshire, SCO; The Model, Sligo, IR; Fotografisk Center, Copenhagen, DK; Cairo Biennale, Cairo, EG; Blackwood Gallery Toronto, CAN; Galerie Ileana Tounta, Athens, GR; Kunsthalle Osnabrück, Osnabrück, DE.