The Musée Maillol is presenting the first major exhibition in Paris devoted to Ben, a major figure on the contemporary art scene in France. Bringing together over 200 works, primarily from his personal collection as well as private collections, Musée Maillol’s retrospective reveals the many facets of an outspoken, provocative artist who has been challenging artistic convention for over 50 years.

In the wake of an ambitious retrospective dedicated to Ben at the Museum Tinguely in Basel in 2015, Andres Pardey, vice-director of the Museum Tinguely, curated the historic context of Ben’s Musée Maillol debut. In the most contemporary sections of the exhibition, Ben has been given carte blanche to take over the museum spaces with his creations, some of which will be presented to the public for the first time.

This exhibition is part of the new exhibition programme organized by Culturespaces at the Musée Maillol.

Since the late 1950s, Ben Vautier (b. 1935), better known as Ben, noted, “I sign everything” -and by doing so comments, through his images and actions, on the world as a whole. Each sentence, however brief, conceals an immense potential to pose crucial questions about truth in art, the role of the artist in society and the relationship between art and life. His writings are wide ranging, from intimate reflections and postmodern theories on art to anthropology and religion. His works reflect his personal questioning of these themes and bear witness to a critical spirit that does not hesitate to question everything and everyone including his own ego. Ben’s work is unique in its blending of art, philosophy and everyday life. Drawing on Marcel Duchamp’s ready-mades Ben systematically perpetuates the idea that a work of art is recognisable not by its material content but exclusively by its signature.

Ben was one of the first artists in Europe to take art to the streets. His famed “street actions”, which ranged from everyday gestures (waiting at a bus stop) to more “offbeat” acts (swimming across the Port of Nice wearing clothes and a hat), made Ben one of the leading artists of the Fluxus movement in Europe after 1959. An artist, performer, organizer, inventor of language, and innovative thinker in art, he was also one of the founding artists of the École de Nice, where he was closely associated with artists such as Arman, Yves Klein and Martial Raysse.