CAKE | Galerie des Galeries

Galerie des Galeries

From 5 to 23 October 202, Galeries Lafayette present CAKE, an artwork by artist Yngve Holen featuring a Porsche Panamera cut into four pieces, in the atrium of the Champs-Elysées store. By exhibiting a major piece from the Fonds de dotation Famille Moulin, the Galeries Lafayette group wishes to offer Parisian and international visitors privileged access to contemporary creation, in line with its historical commitment.

Yngve Holen’s practice draws on industrial design and its applications. Known for his meticulous cuts of everyday objects, for the first time with the work CAKE the artist turned to a mass-produced luxury symbol: a Porsche Panamera coupe. Interested in the incongruity of this racing car, designed both as a sportscar and a family vehicle that seats four, Yngve Holen questions whether the notions of speed and safety are compatible by slicing the car into four sections using a diamond wire.
Once cut and no longer functional, the car was presented as an écorché, cut sides exposed, the better to reveal its bowels and former power. The work therefore puts an end to an ultimate object of desire as much as it questions the capacity to redistribute wealth equally.

#YngveHolen #CAKE #GaleriesLafayetteChampsElysées #LafayetteAnticipations

5 - 23 October 2022
Galeries Lafayette Champs-Elysées
60 av. des Champs-Elysées 75008 Paris
Opening hours: 7/7, 10am - 9pm

Exhibitions

Down to Earth
Martin Gropius Bau, Berlin (Germany)
from 13 Aug to 13 Sep 2020

You
Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Paris (France)
from 11 Oct 2019 to 16 Feb 2020

CAKE
The colette store, Paris (France)
from 19 Jun to 05 Aug 2017

Faisons de l'inconnu un allié
Lafayette Anticipations - Fondation d'entreprise Galeries Lafayette, Paris (France)
from 11 Oct to 23 Oct 2016

VERTICALSEAT
Kunsthalle Basel, Bâle (Switzerland)
from 13 May to 14 Aug 2016

Yngve Holen

Born in 1982 at Braunschweig (Germany). Lives and works between Berlin (Germany) and Oslo (Norway).

The human body, it is often said, is conspicuously absent in the work of the Norwegian German artist Yngve Holen. Yet everywhere in his oeuvre, the implications of the body, its subjectivity, messy corporeality, and imbrications in a culture of consumption, are evoked.

Disemboweled washing machines, bisected water coolers, MRI-scanned and 3D-printed smashed cell phones: Holen has used them all in previous works. His predilection for things that are at one remove from the humans who make, buy, or use them is shaped by an interest in the technologies that define our everyday surroundings, from transportation and plastic surgery to industrial food production and security systems.

He studied at Städelschule in Frankfurt from which he graduated in 2010. In 2016, a monographic exhibition VERTICALSEAT is dedicated to his work at the Kunsthalle Basel and in 2018 he exhibit at the Kunsthalle Düsseldorf.

CAKE

The Porsche Panamera cut into four pieces like a cake testifies a sacrificial gesture imposed unpon a mass-produced luxury object elevated onto the alter of art. Yngve Holen set out to work with a Porsche Panamera, which is promoted as a hybrid between a family and a sports car and, because of this, is unique in its kind.

CAKE, 2016
Plastic, leather, glass, fabric, foam
Medium: Diamond wire cutting
Various dimensions
Collection Lafayette Anticipations - Fonds de dotation Famille Moulin, Paris

Produced by Lafayette Anticipations.
External team: Karl Storms (cutting expert), Jan Van Gils et Stefano Bernier (supplier and technical support for the cutting), Stéphane Tombeur (locksmith), Kyle Joseph et Matthew Evans (artist's assistants).

Production specifications

Collection Fonds de dotation Famille Moulin

The Fonds de dotation Famille Moulin is a sister entity to the Fondation d’entreprise Galeries Lafayette. The endowment fund’s principle mission is to enhance and promote Lafayette Anticipations’ collection.

"Collecting is not the work of one life, but of several. In 2005, my grandmother Ginette Moulin and I made a start on it, in order to see the world around us come together. Inspired by a five-generation passion for artists, we decided to make this family plan part of a general interest project.

Created in 2013, the Moulin Family Endowment Fund houses over 330 works, assembled over 10 years with an equal measure of passion and patience. Alongside the Fondation d’entreprise Galeries Lafayette, which is engaged in a mission to produce works and ideas, this endowment fund is not intended to provide sanctuary to creative work, but rather to bring it to life through an active support policy that directly benefits artists and their projects. This platform is its most transparent expression. We conceived it as a public place, to generate more opportunities for sharing and meeting around works of art."

Guillaume Houzé, Vice-President of the Moulin Family Endowment Fund

Paris+ par Art Basel

As an official partner, Galeries Lafayette associate with the first edition of Paris+ par Art Basel, by presenting CAKE, a major piece from the Lafayette Anticipations - Fonds de dotation Famille Moulin collection, and thus offer visitors privileged access to contemporary creation, in accordance with the Group's historical values.