Né à Dijon le 25 Septembre 1683 (Le Temple de la Gloire), 1983
GPO-0490
Golden pillow, torn photo print, eyeglasses
12 x 58 x 43 cm
Dismantled work
Le Temple de la Gloire is the general subtitle of a work conceived in 1983 and reformulated in overall nine variants (GPO-0490, GPO-0492, GPO-0493, GPO-0500, GPO-0508, GPO-0510, GPO-0526, GPO-0559, GPO-0808). A constant element is the golden pilllow, on which Paolini each time proposes an "offer", while the title quotes a phrase or a verse from the opera libretto of Le Temple de la Gloire (1745) by Jean-Philippe Rameau. Depending on the exhibition itself, the arrangement of the pillow also varies, at times integrated with complementary elements.
The work is based on the contrast between the eloquence of the elegant pillow, evoking a solemn ritual – in a dimension that is outside of the flow of time – and the ephemeral futility of the object offered, which is prosaic and inconsistent.
The first in a series of “ornaments offered to Le Temple de la Gloire”,1 arranged on the golden pillow are the pieces of a torn photographic portrait of the artist – taken by Paolo Mussat Sartor in 1971 – partially stuck in the eyeglasses placed where those worn by Paolini in the picture are. The title refers to the date of birth of Jean-Philippe Rameau.
1 Giulio Paolini, vol. Figures/Intentions (Villeurbanne: Le Nouveau Musée, 1984), p. 25.
Subtitle from the opéra-ballet by Jean-Philippe Rameau, Le Temple de la Gloire, 1745.
| 1983 | Dijon, Le Consortium, best of, from 5 September, no catalogue. |
| 1984 | Villeurbanne, Le Nouveau Musée, Giulio Paolini, 20 January - 18 March, vol. Figures/Intentions, repr. p. 21. |
| 1985-86 | Montreal, Musée d’art contemporain, Giulio Paolini, 7 July - 8 September, touring to: Vancouver, Vancouver Art Gallery, 29 November 1985 - 19 January 1986, same catalogue as for the solo exhibition in Villeurbanne 1984. |
| 1986 (?) | Charleroi, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Giulio Paolini, 15 February - 30 March, same catalogue as for the solo exhibition in Villeurbanne 1984. |
| 1986 | Stuttgart, Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, Giulio Paolini, 20 September - 2 November, not repr. |
| • | G. Paolini in Giulio Paolini, vol. Figures/Intentions (Villeurbanne: Le Nouveau Musée, 1984), p. 25. |
| • | Giulio Paolini, vol. Figures/Intentions (Villeurbanne: Le Nouveau Musée, 1984), repr. p. 21. |
| • | Compilation: une expérience de l’exposition, edited by X. Douroux, F. Gautherot and E. Troncy (Dijon: Les Presses du réel, 1998), col. repr. p. 17 (exhibition view Dijon 1983). |
| • | M. Disch, Giulio Paolini. Catalogo ragionato 1960-1999, vol. 2 (Milan: Skira editore, 2008), cat. no. 490 p. 505, repr. (with incorrect dimensions of the base “80 x 45 x 45 cm”). |
