(born Châtillon-sur-Seine, France in 1949)
‘Donnay N. 1’, titled, signed and dated Bertrand Lavier 1989 on the reverse, with directional arrow, acrylic on table tennis table (in 2 parts), 152.5 x 274 x 5 cm, (PP)

Provenance:
Kewenig Galerie, Berlin
European Private Collection

Exhibition:
Bertrand Lavier, Castello di Rivoli, 17 October 1996 – 12 January 1997, Charta, Milan, exh. cat. ill. p. 68

“Bertrand Lavier [...] has displayed his works in major solo exhibitions at the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris and the Centro per l’arte contemporanea Luigi Pecci in Prato. [...] His objects, sculptures and installations reveal his playful approach to the seemingly complex mechanisms that are involved both in the transformation of everyday objects into art and in the conscious avoidance of genre barriers. His pianos, cars and refrigerators, painted with a thick layer of acrylic colour [or table tennis tables, as in the present case] look light, carefree, and not without the necessary amount of humour. Accentuated brush strokes reveal that it is no lapidary new coat of paint, but rather a process of artistic refinement. In his works Bertrand Lavier asks many fundamental questions concerning cultural activity. He questions artistic forms of expression and interpretive possibilities, the role of the artist, the function and meaning of art objects just as much as their transformation in art through his aestheticising of everyday objects.”
(press release: Kewenig Gallery)