Tino Sehgal

Tino Sehgal is one of the most radical artists of his generation. His work is an attempt to create an art without objects that only exists as a set of gestures and oral instructions carried out by trained interpreters for the entire duration of the exhibition. His work immerses the audience in uncanny situations and intricate choreographies executed by dancers, children, extras, museum guards and art world professionals. Tino Sehgal acts like the director of a role game, in which gestures and bodies are used to construct tableaux vivants of surreal beauty. A visit to a Tino Sehgal's exhibition consists of a sequence of encounters with people knotted in sensual embraces and human sculptures wriggling on the floor as if caught in a hysteric frenzy. Other times Sehgal's compositions function as scripted pieces of chamber theatre, in which viewers and actors are invited to exchange views, experiences and other forms of knowledge. Installed within the stucco and the golden framed mirrors of Villa Reale, Sehgal's choreography take on a ghostly presence but can also be read as carefully rehearsed conversation pieces of a new rococo. Joyful as a celebration and repetitive as a mysterious ritual, Sehgal's work is also a reflection on the value and the space of art. His work only exists as an oral tradition, a legend, a story that cannot be photographed or illustrated: Tino Sehgal's peculiar form of sculpture betrays an ascetic, ecological tension, as it tries to exist in the world without leaving any trace. (Fondazione Nicola Trussardi)