SAINT-PAUL.- For the major summer exhibition of 2013, the Maeght Foundation gives carte blanche to philosopher and writer Bernard-Henri Lévy. On the theme of "Painting and philosophy," Bernard-Henri Lévy, artistic curator, offers us an itinerary made up of seven "stations" in order to understand the age-old battle between philosophy and painting, sometimes rivals, sometimes allies. One hundred or so ancient and contemporary works from public and private collections, both French and international, are brought together. This exhibition includes some works from the Marguerite and Aimé Maeght Foundation's holdings and the Maeght family’s collection.

If the Maeght Foundation is known for its history with artists, it is also the place where, to paraphrase André Malraux, "something perhaps is happening in the history of the mind." A dialogue between art and thought has taken place in Saint Paul with writers, poets (Jacques Prévert, Francis Ponge, Pierre Reverdy ...), but also philosophers (many of whom wrote major texts for Behind the mirror), from Jean-Paul Sartre to Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, Michel Onfray, Jean-Francois Lyotard, Jean-Luc Nancy, Paolo Fabbri ... The Maeght Foundation also owns one of the largest book collections in the world, where researchers from all over the world come every year to study books by artists, writers and philosophers featuring in its library. In this «spirit », in August 2011, Olivier Kaeppelin, director of the Maeght Foundation, asked Bernard-Henri Lévy, a close friend of the Maeght Foundation since childhood and a resident of St. Paul de Vence, to reflect on the relationship between art and philosophy for the summer 2013 exhibition.

Olivier Kaeppelin explains: « Is there any subject more exciting for a man who loves art and culture than the relationship between painting and philosophy? After long conversations with Bernard-Henri Lévy, this enquiry took the form of a narrative. With as much scholarship as passion, Bernard-Henri Lévy offers an exciting exhibition to all the patrons of the Maeght Foundation and a question: which truth do we, each with our own individual experiences and sensitivity, give to the image and to forms? It is essential to understand the question of knowledge through sight and thought. Passing through the rooms of the Maeght Foundation, each visitor will be invited to confront their own view of this story of our time ».

«On the relationship between painting and literature, there are plenty of works. On the representation, in painting, of the very image of the philosopher, on the movement of thought, there have been exhibitions. On the other hand, the question of knowing how philosophy works or hinders painting or, by contrast, how painting prolongs, revives or silences philosophy, the question of the battle between a philosophy whose first desires were to ban from the City artists automatically rejected to the side of the shadow or the simulacrum and between painting that quickly resisted, counter-attacked, even challenged the philosophy of the very territory where it reigned, this question remains unclear and concerns us here.» explains Bernard-Henri Lévy.

The exhibition offers a back and forth movement between ancient, modern and contemporary art; between a crucifixion by Bronzino and by Basquiat, a “Ecce Homo” by Yves Klein, a St. Veronica from the fifteenth century and its reinterpretation by Picabia or Jim Dine; between a Paul Chenavard painting claiming to illustrate Hegel and a work by Joseph Kosuth claiming to exceed and to extend beyond Hegelianism.

In a series of short videos, filmed by Bernard-Henri Levy himself we will watch contemporary artists (including Marina Abramovic, Miquel Barceló, Olafur Eliasson, Alexandre Singh, Huang Yong Ping, Jacques Monory, Anselm Kiefer, Gérard Garouste, Kehinde Wiley, Maurizio Cattelan, Zeng Fanzhi and Enrico Castellani) reading a page of philosophy (Plato, Hegel, Schelling, a fragment of the Talmud, etc.). Black and white. Artist facing the camera. In the location of their choice. These films, which operate as reinforcements and movements of thought, will bring through their words, another form of inspiration alongside that of the artwork.