La belle peinture est derrière nous: 25 French painters take over Istanbul's Antrepo 5

Curated by Eva Hober and initiated by French cultural counselor Jean-Luc Maslin, the exhibition 'La belle peinture est derrière nous' opened at Sanat Limani-Antrepo 5 in Istanbul from November 27 to December 26, 2010. The show brings together 25 young French painters (mostly in their thirties) to counter the nostalgic view that painting ended with modernism. The vast industrial space along the Bosphorus, which also hosts the Istanbul Biennial and Istanbul Modern, was chosen by Beral Madra. The title provocatively asserts that contemporary painting possesses a different, unsettling beauty. Works range from Marlène Mocquet's comic scenes to Damien Cadio's ghostly canvases, from Élodie Lesourd's frozen installations to Audrey Nervi's rave party depictions. Violence is a recurring theme: Jérôme Zonder and Raphaëlle Ricol depict torture; Kosta Kulundzic reinterprets Catholic martyrdoms with humor; Axel Pahlavi shows a crucified Christ over a burning Berlin; Ida Tursic and Wilfried Mille paint a house on fire; Stéphane Pencréac'h's quadriptych shows fighter jets bombing Paris while people party underground. Other artists like Florence Obrecht and Katia Bourdarel explore feminine archetypes and fairy tales. The exhibition will travel to the Middle East (including Ankara), then to Los Angeles, and finally settle at Le Lieu unique in Nantes in 2012.