Centre Pompidou mounts unprecedented comics exhibition across six floors

From May 29 to November 4, 2024, the Centre Pompidou in Paris presents "La BD à tous les étages," a major exhibition spanning all six floors of the Renzo Piano, Gianfranco Franchini, and Richard Rogers-designed building. Curated by Anne Lemonnier and Emmanuèle Payen with experts Thierry Groensteen and Lucas Hureau, the show offers a multimedia and historiographic journey through comics. The sixth floor features "Comics, 1964–2024," a twelve-chapter survey of graphic styles and themes since the 1960s, including the Japanese magazine Garo and Robert Crumb's underground comics. On the fifth floor, the permanent modern art collection dialogues with contemporary comic artists, pairing Henri Matisse with Philippe Dupuy, Francis Picabia with Anna Sommer, and Francis Bacon with Lorenzo Mattotti. A monographic section on Corto Maltese, curated by Emmanuèle Payen and Monika Prochniewicz with Hugo Pratt's assistant Patrizia Zanotti, occupies the Bibliothèque publique d'information on the second floor, featuring original documents, drawings, and unpublished plates. The exhibition includes a program of talks, conferences, and workshops in the "Comics out of the box" section on the lower level. Organized in collaboration with the Fonds Hélène & Édouard Leclerc, the project aims to give academic depth to the increasingly popular discipline of comics. France's comics market sold over 75 million copies in 2023, generating €877 million in revenue, according to GfK data.