The works of Tom Wesselmann, who express the states of desire, are visible until 6th January at Villa Paloma. Admission is free every day.
It’s a little Christmas gift in the long run. On the occasion of the end of year celebrations, the New National Museum of Monaco has chosen to offer the entrance to all its visitors to discover the exhibition dedicated to Tom Wesselmann.
We discover the work of the American artist, a figure of Pop Art that disappeared in 2004. A master in the art of the nude who plays on the progression of the states of desire on his canvases gathered by the curator Chris Sharp, under a title evocative: “the promise of happiness”, borrowed from Stendhal.
A bold promise on the walls of Villa Paloma where the bias was to stage twenty-six works drawn in the production of the artist between 1963 and 1993 to tell the progression of a desire. Notably via his “big American nudes”, past reference of the discipline.
Step by step, sensation after sensation. There is no chronology or retrospective desire in this presentation: only the way the artist has translated on canvas, in painting or collage, the rise of desire in a body that is revealed, shows and touch ecstasy.
The body is like a totem, with an eroticism that balances between suggestion and raw nudity. The paintings linger on a detail: a leg, a breast, a foot or a volume of smoke from a cigarette that we imagine lit after love.
The set is worth seeing until 6th January, before the Villa Paloma closes its doors to prepare its appointments in 2019.
Until 6th January, every day from 10 am to 6 pm at Villa Paloma. Free access.