Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/820209
HUYGHE'S IMAGINATIVE, UNCANNY APPROACH to the serious ecological and social issues facing our planet tie his oeuvre to the ancient purposes of sculpture: They possess a shamanistic quality which tips the mimetic into life. — Jeremy Strick 26 STARRY, STARRY NIGHT AT THE NASHER By Filippo Tattoni-Marcozzi. Photography Bruno, Daniel Driensky, Bret Redman. A fter a year's worth of events around the world, from Dallas to Mexico City to Berlin, the second annual Nasher Prize was awarded to French artist Pierre Huyghe during a starry gala held in the Nasher Sculpture Center garden. "His expansive view of sculpture so wonderfully embodies the goal of the Nasher Prize, which is to champion the greatest artistic minds of our time," pronounced Nasher Sculpture Center director Jeremy Strick. More than anyone today, Huyghe represents a quintessentially modern approach to the future of sculpture. In homage to his otherworldly work, the Nasher Sculpture Center draped the dinner tent in a canopy of greenery, branches, and leaves, as if we had stepped inside Huyghe's jungle-like art event-installation at the Sydney Opera House, A Forest of Lines (2008). Adding to the surrealist nature of the evening was Jane Magnolia Jane, a band comprised of Danny Skinner, Greg Ruppe, and Jeff Gibbons, whose haunting electronica-Zen music came by way of a vintage fi lm projector- recording device, an unpeeled orange, a sewing machine, hundreds of electrical wires, and dozens of other unusual objects. For the event, the Nasher installed two of Huyghe's immensely poetic and captivating works: Untitled, 2013-2014, which drew attention in the Nasher's lobby during cocktail hour, with its fl oating rocks and hermit crab, and outside, La déraison, 2014, on loan from the exception- al Rachofsky collection. Huyghe creates ever-changing eco-systems that will nev- er stop intriguing, amusing, and stim- ulating the audience, challenging the three-dimensionality of sculptures with esoteric concepts such as time, narra- tion, and his unique sense of humor. All was encapsulated masterfully by the Nasher for this one-night affair. From left, Nancy Rubins, Joshua Feigenbuam, Lewis Kachur, Catherine Craft Yuko Hasegawa with Pierre Huyghe's Le deraison, 2014 Lauren Woods, Tahir Hemphill Claire & Brian Gogel Catherine Rose Doris Salcedo Allen & Kelli Questrom Pablo León De La Barra Sofi a Bastidas Steve & Carol Nash Cindy Rachofsky Adam Lippes Nancy Rogers Nicolas Bourriaud Frank Elbaz (continued to page 27)