(METZ).- The year has begun to unfold through five figures, five forces, five ways of inhabiting the world.
In January, Louise Nevelson: Mrs. N’s Palace opened the season. The first exhibition of this scope in France, this homage returns to the force of her monumental assemblages, where spirituality, geometry, and magic converge. These “environments” reshaped the grammar of sculpture and layed the groundwork for installation art. The exhibition unfolds as a true scenographic experience—an immersion in a total work.
In April, François Morellet: 100 per cent brings together one hundred works spanning more than seventy years, from early figurative paintings to experiments with light. Oscillating between mathematical order and optical disruption—between reason and unreason—it follows two essential lines in his work: geometry and a sustained reflection on art itself. The exhibition forms part of 100 x Morellet, the centenary program dedicated to the artist, unfolding across France and extending as far as the Villa Medici in Rome.
In October, we will present the first monographic exhibition devoted to Séraphine de Senlis. A visionary and proto-ecofeminist, she painted nature as a mystical force—flowers, leaves, and fruit vibrating with cosmic intensity, where the visible and the invisible meet. The exhibition continues a series of monographs devoted to singular trajectories, following figures such as Eva Aeppli and Suzanne Valadon.
In December, the Centre Pompidou-Metz will turn to its own architect, Shigeru Ban. Conceived for the museum—his first major international project—the exhibition is curated and designed by Ban himself, unfolding as a work in its own right, embedded within his broader practice. It traces his transformation of ordinary materials, notably paper tubes, into inhabitable structures, his formative influences as well as his deeply humanitarian commitment to emergency architecture.
Assembling, illuminating, enchanting, sheltering—these gestures echo throughout the year, alongside Dimanche sans fin: Maurizio Cattelan and the Centre Pompidou Collection, which continues to evolve, welcoming new constellations, including André Breton’s desk and ensembles of radically diverse objects from his Paris studio. Presented without hierarchy or chronology, this collection reflects the spirit of Dimanche sans fin, where unexpected juxtapositions open onto new perspectives.
In the Paper Tube Studio—once Shigeru Ban’s studio and now dedicated to participatory projects—Marina Abramović continues a cycle initiated with Counting the Rice and Looking at Colors, works of attention, endurance, and inner drift. In May, Mutual Gaze will complete this trilogy, inviting visitors to take the time to look at one another. The studio will then host a project by Ban himself, extending his architectural thinking into a collective space.
In the Studio, a choreographic exhibition by William Forsythe further reflects our interdisciplinary approach. Performances, lectures, and encounters unfold throughout the season in close dialogue with the exhibitions. Important figures such as Trajal Harrell and Philippe Quesne return to the Centre Pompidou-Metz, where they have each previously presented seminal works, and are invited to develop new projects this year. Around the exhibitions, sculptural forms resonate with reimagined dances by Mary Wigman and Loïe Fuller, revisited by Ola Maciejewska and Latifa Laâbissi, in a lineage extending to Merce Cunningham and Martha Graham. Works by Liz Santoro, Pierre Godard, and Hervé Birolini explore relationships between art, mathematics, music, and energy, while Trajal Harrell pays homage to Keith Jarrett’s Köln Concert.
Meanwhile, the École du Centre Pompidou-Metz, a school without walls or a roof, has begun its second year. Each month, middle-school students take part in workshops led by artists, writers, musicians, scientists, and other cultural figures. Under the guidance of Annette Messager, they are invited to think about love, with Roland Barthes as their compass.
