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• Fabrice HYBERT

Lucon, France, 1961

Fabrice Hybert specializes in tapping into what he has called 'the enormous reservoir of the possible'. His aim is to examine the way we communicate, and to mimic the endless linkages between ideas.

Hybert's art ranges from drawings, paintings and objects to installations, performances, traveling public artworks and videos. Since the mid-80s, his considerable output has evolved as a constantly proliferating lattice, a network of autonomous but related pieces whose goal is to represent the proliferation of thought itself.

Hybert studied at the Ecole des Beaux-arts in Nantes at the beginning of the 80s, where he became interested in questions of scale, biology and mechanics. An early piece, Transformation of the World into a Thread (1980), posits the concept of the Earth's density expressed as a single line, and consists of a hand-written calculation resulting in an inconceivably large number. The Islands (1989) is a series of drawings and models which propose an insane architectural project: to lower the level of the sea in such a way as to reunite the continents into one land mass. Such musings represent the way the mind tries to interpret and resolve the complexity of reality by constantly searching for possible, or not so possible, hypotheses.

Hybert addresses his themes with an anarchic sense of purpose. His sculpture Translation (1991) consisted of the biggest bar of soap in the world (as recorded in the Guinness Book of Records), an imponderable object of such stupefying size as to contradict both experience and logic. In 1997, at the Venice Biennale, he set up a working television studio, broadcasting alongside the national channels, with which the public could freely interact.

For several years Hybert has produced a series of Prototypes d'objects en fonctionnement (prototypes of working objects), or POF. These sculptures are often wry mutations of banal everyday objects. Swing (POF No 3, 1990) is a variation of a playground swing with the addition of two phallic protuberances on the seat, one hard, one soft. Roof-Ceiling (POF No 10, 1995) consists of a mechanical device which vacuums up the rubbish in a room and deposits it in a transparent ceiling overhead; installed in a hairdressing salon, it allows the viewer's newly sheared locks to become part of the architecture.

Hybert offers these objects as sites of fluid and shifting meaning. Viewers can interact with them to explore alternative and unlikely 'uses'. To encourage this kind of participation, the POF are employed as props in short videos featuring Hybert's collaborator, Eliane Pine Carrington, a flamboyant transvestite whose improvisational abilities lend these 'tests' a surreal and absurd quality. In 1994 Hybert created a company, Unlimited Responsibility, to distribute POF products and services.

GALLERY REPRESENTATIONS

Galerie Erna Hecey, Luxembourg

Galerie Eigen + Art, Berlin, Germany

Galerie Peter Klichmann, Zurich, Switzerland

SELECTED PERMANENT COLLECTIONS De Vleesthal, Middelburg, The Netherlands

FRAC, Corsica

FRAC, des Pays de la Loire, France

FRAC, Languedoc-Roussillon, France

FRAC, Limousin, France

FRAC, Picardie, France

FRAC, Poitou-Charente, France

FRAC, Provence Alpes Cote d'Azur, France

Fonds Departmental d'Art Contemporain de Seine Saint Denis, Bobigny, France

Fonds National d'Art Contemporain, Paris, France

Galerie fur Zeitgenossische Kunst, Leipzig, Germany

Musee d'Art Contemporain CAPC, Bordeaux, France

Musee d'Art Contemporain de Anvers MUKHA, Belgium

Musee d'Art Contemporain de Gand, Belgium

Musee d'Art Contemporain St. Pierre, Lyon, France

Musee d'Art Moderne de la ville de Paris, France

Musee d'Art Moderne de St Ã?tienne, France

Musee de l'Abbaye Ste Croix, le Sables d'Olonne, France

Musee des Beaux-Arts, Nantes, France

Musee National d'Art Moderne, Centre Pompidou, Paris

SMCA, Sonje Museum of Contemporary Art, Kyongju, South Korea

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITION

Kunsthalle Lophem, Bruges, Belgium, 2001

Watari-um Tokyo, Japan, 2000

Musee d'Art de la ville de Pori, Finland, 2000

Musee d'Art de la ville Reykjavik, Iceland, 2000

'Abres fruitiers dans la ville (fruit trees of the town)', Cahors, France, 2000

'Inconnue' a l'Arc de Triomphe dans le cadre de la manifestation 'Changement de temps'

organisee par la caisse des monuments historiques, et des sites, Paris, France, 2000 Ace Gallery, Mexico, 2000

Calories - Vendee Globale, Fondation Cartier, France, 2000

Musee Guadalajara, Mexico, 2000

Ace Gallery, Los Angeles, 2000

Eclairage de la Jigumae, une des avenue de Tokyo, Japan, 2000

Centre d'Art Contemporain de Linz, Austria, 2000

Musee d'Art de la ville de Goteborg, Sweden, 1999

Creation d'un eclairage public, 3 Raume - 3 Flusse, Hann Munden, Germany, 1999

Galerie Eigen + Art, Berlin, Germany, 1999

Musee de Sapporo, Japan, 1999

Galerie Peter Kilchmann, Zurich, Switzerland, 1999

Naf, Oslo, Norway, 1999

Musee d'Art de la ville de Bergen, Norway, 1999

Setagaya Museum, Japan, 1999

Residence 50, Bruges, Belgium, 1999

Testoo Poitiers, Confort Moderne, France, 1998

Fondation De Appel, Amsterdam, Holland, 1998

Kunsthalle Glaurus, Switzerland, 1998

Kunsthalle Saint Gallen, Switzerland, 1998

Jack Tilton Gallery, New York, USA, 1998

Galerie Erne Hecey, Luxembourg, 1997

'Deep Narcissus', Haus, Anvers, Belgium, 1997

French Pavillon, Venice Biennial, Venice, Italy, 1997

Muster-Testoo, Leipzig, Germany, 1997

Galerie Eigen + Art, Berlin, Germany, 1997 Galerie Peter Klichmann, Zurich, Switzerland, 1997

Kunstraum Luneburg, Germany, 1996

Jack Tilton Gallery, New York, USA, 1996

Eigen + Art, Leipzig, Germany, 1996

Kunsthalle Lophem, Bruges, Belgium, 1996

Vleeshal, Middleburg, The Netherlands, 1996

Station u 841, Berlin, Germany, 1996

ARC Musee d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, France, 1995

Musee de Saint-Ã?tienne, France, 1995

Galerie Froment-Putman, Paris, 1995

Kunsthalle Lophem, Bruges, Belgium, 1994

Galerie Arlogos FIAC, France, 1994

Galerie ZenoX, Anvers, Belgium, 1994

'Traduction' tour du savon dans Centres Leclerc, le Parvis, Pau, France, 1994

Contemporary Art Center, Moscow, Russia, 1994

'500eme anniversaire de Rabelais', Le Confort Moderne, Poitiers, France, 1994

Musee d'Art Contemporain CAPC, Bordeaux, France, 1993

Musee des Beaux-Arts de Nantes, Nantes, France, 1993

Center d'Art du Creux de l'Enfer, Thiers, France, 1992

Galerie Arlogos, Nantes, France, 1992

Musee Robert Walser, Gais, Switzerland, 1992

Galerie Froment-Putman, Paris, France, 1992

Center d'Art Contemporain de la Criee, Rennes, France, 1992

'Vis a vis, le miroir des galeries', Galerie Arlogos, Anciens Establissements Sacre, Liege, Belgium, 1991

Galerie Interface, Nimes, France, 1991

Galerie Froment-Putman, Paris, France, 1990

'Change', DRAC, Poitiers, France, 1989

Theater Municipal de Caen, Caen, France, 1989

Galerie Arlogos, Nantes, France, 1989

Galerie Riverin-Arlogos, Montreal, Canada, 1988

'POLLUTION', Galerie Arlogos, Nantes, France, 1987

Hotel de Ville d'Ussel, Ussel, France, 1987

DRAC, Limousin, Limoges, France, 1987

'MUTATION', Maison de l'Avocat, Nantes, France, 1986