Can a few dozen square meters adequately honor the myriad lives of Chantal Akerman, whose pioneering work straddles the realms of art, cinema, and literature, impacting generations of aficionados? This season, Jeu de Paume rises to the challenge. The Traveling exhibition, a collaboration with Brussels’ Palais des Beaux-Arts, the Chantal Akerman Foundation, and the Royal Belgian Film Archive, showcases films, installations, and rare archives. It casts a spotlight on Akerman’s lesser-known sculptural dimension, echoing through her entire body of work.
The first thing that catches the eye is the originality of the video setups in the initial two dark, subdued rooms. It all begins almost at the end, with “Woman Sitting after Killing,” an installation derived from the final scene of Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (hailed as the “Best Film of All Time” in 2022). Seven screens simultaneously display the seven-minute long, static shot that has reached cult status: Delphine Seyrig sits almost motionless at her kitchen table—a scene that seems mundane but is contradicted by the installation’s title and subtle nuances in the character’s movements.
Another major piece is “D’Est, au bord de la fiction,” an installation based on the documentary Akerman filmed in Eastern Europe after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Here, she captures the essence of a time caught between two epochs, in lands where yesterday is gone and tomorrow is yet to arrive. No fewer than twenty-five screens in four rows showcase these long, mesmerizing sequences, with a plethora of images whose fragmentation is dizzying.
Aged just seventeen years old, Chantal, a young Brussels native passionate about film and writing, directed her inaugural short film, Saute ma ville—a visionary piece in which she casts herself as a housewife chaotically throwing a small kitchen into disarray. Today, nearly ten years after her suicide, the experimental nature of her work continues to fascinate. Traveling salutes, among other things, her knack for build bridges between various disciplines: Akerman was a pioneer in taking cinema beyond traditional theaters and into museums, thereby blending cinema, performance art, visual arts, and literature.
The expansive archive room shows a striking contrast to the rest of the exhibit: bathed in white light, it centers around a long table scattered with scripts, files, and articles. The walls are adorned with biographical panels—a patchwork of texts, production stills, and press cuttings that chronicle her life. Here, one can clearly see Chantal Akerman’s rejection of conventional boundaries, both geographical and thematic. She has traversed the globe, capturing borderlands like the Arizona desert (A Voice in the Desert), where Mexican migrants strive to reach the United States. Her work spanned every conceivable genre, format, and style. Her enduring motif: a profound quest for freedom.
On the lower level of the Jeu de Paume, American photographer Tina Barney, born in 1945 into a wealthy East Coast family, takes us to vastly different territories. The exhibition Family Ties revisits her forty-year career as a portraitist who is captivated by familial relationships. This retrospective, featuring large-scale, vividly colored photographs, is the most extensive European showcase of Barney’s work to date. A unique aspect of the display is the accompanying texts—critiques from various eras that provide diverse insights into Barney’s work, alongside the artist’s own reflections.
Barney began photographing in the 1970s, initially focusing her lens on her own family. Her unvarnished portrayal exposes the social roles individuals adopt, either willingly or under duress, and explores the intricate connections between people and generations, as well as the transmission of conventions. “People probably think that I dedicate my work to high society or the affluent, which bothers me,” she notes. “I’m not sure if the audience realizes that these are my family members.” Indeed, Barney offers a glimpse into a “WASP paradise”—a portrayal of the leisurely, white East Coast elite, captured at lavish receptions in settings that subtly disclose a level of privilege. This precise documentation of the upper class is a rarity in the field of photography.
Yet, Barney refrains from judgment or biting criticism in her photographs; instead, they serve as a medium for introspection and, more importantly, profound emancipation, offering an escape from stifling social determinism. She extended this exploration of intra-familial bonds to other groups, including affluent European families, and later, in 2015–2016, she photographed the descendants—children and grandchildren—of her earlier subjects (these are the photographs showcased at the exhibition’s outset). As one critical essay aptly notes, “Barney’s familiarity with her subjects turns what could have been a harsh social satire into something much more subtle and insightful.”
Tina Barney’s work is distinguished by her attention to detail. The photograph “Tom, Phil and Me” captures her alongside her two sons at a summer barbecue; in this seemingly trivial scene, significant details emerge, such Tina’s neck muscles tensed, possibly reflecting the challenging period of adolescence of her sons. This theme recurs in “Bridesmaids in Pink,” featuring close relatives and friends: “My favorite detail is the glove on the brunette’s right,” Barney remarks. “Her outstretched finger nearly touching the frame’s edge and her starched white cotton glove were compelling reasons to capture this moment.” Similarly, “The Hands” portrays a father and son pose, their arms crossed in perfect mimicry, subtly probing the extent to which gestures are passed down through generations.
Barney has said: “I want each object to be as clear and precise as possible, so that the viewer can really examine it and feel as though they were stepping into the room.” She accomplishes this through a meticulous composition that narrates beyond the immediate scene, as seen in “The Flag,” where three children lower the American flag, creating a visual parallel between the stripes of their clothing and the flag they handle. Through such careful attention to setting and detail, Tina Barney crafts spaces and stories that transcend their moment, elevating them to the timeless realm of art.
“Chantal Akerman, Traveling“, and “Tina Barney, Family Ties“, on display at the Jeu de Paume, Paris, until January 19, 2025.
