2024

Villa Medici
Rome

A Piu Voci / Fellows’ exhibition

As it does every year when summer is just around the corner, the French Academy in Rome stages an exhibition of the projects created by its sixteen Fellows during their year-long residency at Villa Medici draws to a close.

2024

GAMEC
Bergamo

The Parliament of Marmots

The 9th edition of Biennale Gherdëina borrows its title from one of the most enchanting Ladin myths of the Dolomites, which tells the story of the Fanes: a meek and peaceful people whose kingdom extended beyond the seven mountains to the edge of the world. 

2023

Gabès Cinema Fen
Gabès

Masterclass

When I was approached to do this masterclass, I found myself asking a question: How can I convey my way of working without relying too much on language and explanation? I realized that the best way to say as little as possible would be to show as much as possible.

2023

Museo Reina Sofia
Madrid

Machinations

Machinations explores different forms of resistance, coalition and creativity that materialises in the present by way of around fifty artists, most of whom hail from the Mediterranean area and African continent and reflect on the historical and present-day circumstances of such territories.

2022

Grey Noise
Dubai

Films

The exhibition Films is conceived as a set of observations, of “note-takings” or “pick-ups” and focuses essentially on a series of sculptures. These objects are a kind of recordings as they capture the essence of spaces and durations.

2022

La Boîte
Tunis

Digital

I am writing this text 20 days before the opening of the exhibition. I am in the anti chamber, eager to see it take form. I have always loved these moments of waiting, preparing for the intense time of installation. In the meantime, I'm writing to share with you certain intuitions that built this exhibition and to evoke, a bit, the works that constitute it.

2021

Le Grand Café
Saint Nazaire

Chroniques de l’invisible

This exhibition is a part of the cycle Généalogies fictives [Fictional Genealogies], developped by Guillaume Désanges for the art center from the end of 2018 to the end of 2020.

2021

Selma Feriani Gallery Tunis

Ismaïl Bahri

Solo show at Selma Feriani Gallery from February 22 to April 4, 2021.

2020

CAPC
Bordeaux

Around the Day in Eighty Worlds

Borrowing its title from an anthology of texts by Julio Cortázar, the exhibition Around the Day in Eighty Worlds revisits major works from the collection of the CAPC under the angle of changing systems of representation.

2020

Martine Aboucaya Gallery
Paris

Oblique Strategies

This exhibition, built on immateriality, unfolds in two parts and brings together in the first part documents, ideas, protocols, and proposals from twelve artists. The second part will also include performances, installations, and interventions from writers. Most of the works will be different in the two parts. Oblique Strategies is the third proposal from the Voix Off Collective.

2019

Le Forum
Tokyo

Invisible Concern

In autumn 2019, the Forum’s curator, Reiko Setsuda, offers carte blanche to Guillaume Désanges, her colleague at La Verrière in Brussels, for an exhibition. Désanges brings to Tokyo an experimental project on perception, which began in 2018 with Bahri’s solo exhibition, Des gestes à peine déposés dans un paysage agité.

2019

Akinci Gallery
Amsterdam

What Can a Dot Become?

This exhibition centres around the primary sign of the dot. Modest, but certainly decisive, it is what connects the artworks of the 6 artists gathered for this occasion in the space of AKINCI: Ismaïl Bahri, Charbel-Joseph H.Boutros, Stéphanie Dadour, Sirine Fattouh, Stéphanie Saadé, Lei Saito and Vincent Verhoef.

 

2019

Beirut Art Center
Lebanon

Touché! (Gesture, Movement, Action)

Touché (gestures, movement, action) is a collective exhibition that privileges the vitality of experimental practices and the fertility of the dialogue between the arts. Touché (gestures, movement, action) brings together the works of artists from Lebanon and the international scene, as an extension of Scènes du geste.

2019

STUK
Leuven

Parallel Crossings

On February 21st we welcome you for a new edition of Artefact, an exhibition and festival on contemporary visual arts, current events and societal challenges. Parallel Crossings takes the text by stanley brouwn here above as its starting and crossing point. brouwn developed in his body of work a relation to the world, a relation which he constantly requalified by the act of walking and the use and reconsideration of measurements, distances and movements.

2019

Nijo Castle
Kyoto

ムーナ・メクアール / Kusunoki

In this display of his work, Ismaïl Bahri makes full use of scenery outside Nijo Castleʼs Okiyodokoro and the light that infiltrates, bringing out the special qualities of the space.

2019

Marcelle Alix -
Paris -

De l'amitié

There is, in this exhibition, that which stems from striking reads, encounters and conversations; that which stems from insignificant and random circumstances; that which stems from what happened prior to the gallery; that which gives consistency to our programme: our imagination and everything that arises among us, in between, and that finds its place.

2018

La Verrière
Bruxelles

Des gestes à peine déposé dans un paysage agité

At the invitation of La Verrière, for his first solo exhibition in Belgium, Ismaïl Bahri created an ambitious project that transforms the architecture of the space into an optical instrument, playing with shadows and light, and the appearance and disappearance of images from both inside the building and outside.

2018

Dazibao
Montreal

Ismaïl Bahri + James Benning + Ralitsa Doncheva + Miriam Sampaio

As if on the periphery of the gaze, because often what commands our attention is located outside the frame, the work of Ismaïl Bahri, James Benning, Ralitsa Doncheva and Miriam Sampaio carefully document the occupation of a site which, for reasons both personal and political, is the only witness, even the sole legatee, of past or future events, giving form to an exile either desired or imposed, permanent or temporary.

2018

Espace Khiasma
Les Lilas

Lundi de Phantom n°31

For the 31st edition of Lundi de Phantom, Ismail Bahri returned to l’Espace Khiasma to present his most recent research, filmed between the Isle of Ushant and the Tunisian desert.

2018

Porto Seguro
São Paulo

Instrumentos

Instrumentos explains the critical and at the same time sensitive dimension of Bahri's work, turning to the contemporary world and inviting the viewer to sensitivity and attention.

2017

Galerie de l’UQAM
Montreal

Uprisings

Uprisings is a cross-disciplinary exhibition on the theme of collective emotions and also political events where they involve crowds of people in revolt. It will be about social disorder, political agitation, uprisings, rebellions, revolts, revolutions, racket and riots – disturbances of all kinds.

2017

Museo de Arte de Zapopan
Mexico

La salud y sus metáforas

Health as Metaphor is an exhibition that seeks to explore certain artistic practices dealing with the care and understanding of the human body and with the treatment of real or imaginary ills, from a perspective different from that of allopathic medicine.

2017

Gray Noise
Dubai

Ghosting of beings and worlds

The title of this exhibition is borrowed from the essay "Mathémathiques Existentielles” by French artist Laurent Derobert; In his work, Derobert tries to capture with mathematical formulas, impalpable feelings and emotions, using mathematical formulas as ghost traps.
 

2017

FMAC
Geneva

be aware, record

From the militant cinema of the 70s to smartphones documenting the Arab Spring, the moving image captures fragments of history in the making.

2017

Jeu de Paume
Paris

Instruments

Instruments presents a selection of  Ismaïl Bahri's principal works along with two new works, conceived and produced for the occasion. This set of eight video works reflects the main themes running through his œuvre; such themes as fundamentals, duration, scale, and transformation, but also visibility and invisibility, mystery and solving the mystery.

2017

Sharjah
UAE

Sharjah Biennial 13 / Tamawuj

Curated by Christine Tohme, Sharjah Biennial 13, Tamawuj unfolds in five parts from October 2016 through January 2018. Featuring over fifty international artists, the biennial encompasses exhibitions and a public programme in two acts in Sharjah and Beirut; a year-long education programme in Sharjah; projects in Dakar, Ramallah, Istanbul and Beirut; and an online publishing platform.

2016

Jeu de Paume
Paris

Uprisings

Uprisings is a trans-disciplinary exhibition on the theme of human gestures that raise up the world or rise up against it: collective or individual gestures, actions or passions, works or thoughts. They are gestures which say no to a state of history that is considered too “heavy” and that therefore needs to be “lifted” or even sent packing. They are also gestures that say yes to something else: to a desired better world, an imagined or adumbrated world, a world that could be inhabited and conceived differently.

2016

Les Ateliers de Rennes -
Contemporary Art Biennale

Incorporated!

“What are emotions we are about to have in a future already present? The era of emotions is over. One prefers a mood or mood predictor […] which in turn become logos for products, which in turn become product-emotions, which in turn become consumers (by-products),” once stated American poet Tan Lin. In other words: What are the consequences of our incorporation into the abstract systems of our economic world?

2015

BBB Art Center
Toulouse

Collective Collection

Invited by the BBB, artist and collector Laurent Fiévet presents part of his private collection in this three-part exhibition. The title "Collective Collection" highlights not just the collective nature of the exhibition, but also the existence of communities, artistic networks, and the shared experience brought to life through the displayed collection.

2015

LaM
Valenciennes

Là où commence le jour

The exhibition Where the Day Begins, presented as part of lille3000 - Renaissance, takes the form of a poetic journey centered on the theme of individual emancipation through the (re)discovery of the surrounding world.

2015

The Blackwood
Toronto

The pen moves across the earth

This exhibition explores the means by which knowledge of the elemental forces and geopolitical processes impacting upon us in the 21st century can be generated in the presence and absence of evidence. Combining raw minerals and high-tech elements, each work in the exhibition makes visible the forces of composition and decomposition that are rumbling just below or flowing across the surface of the Earth. 

2015

Espace Khiasma
Les Lilas

Lundi de Phantom n°14

This Phantom Monday will offer the opportunity to observe and contemplate some initial attempts at spatializing the videos currently being made, with the aim of transforming the venue into a space for seeing.

2015

Les Filles du Calvaire Paris

Film à blanc

Film à blanc proposes an elaboration of the exhibition Sommeils which took place at the Espace Khiasma at the end of 2014. This exhibition provides a different approach to similar motifs such as pulsing lights, film, as well the mechanics of appearance and disappearance.

 

2014

Les Eglises
Chelles

Sondes

Ismail Bahri’s presence is evident. His work is the expression of an exploration into the primordial state of things and triggers, in the immediacy of what he portrays and in the simplicity of the relationship with the elements which he imbues, the desire to speak of the result — an uncomplicated beauty.

2014

Selma Feriani Gallery
Tunis

Détail se dilate

This exhibition presents a selection of works all derived from experiments that shape various simple elements, most of which were created in Tunisia. The videos and installations are used to capture experiences while visually presenting the terms of different enigmas.

2014

Espace Khiasma
Les Lilas

sommeils

sommeils brings together pieces created during Ismaïl Bahri's year-long residency. For a year, the artist shared his research with the public at Espace Khiasma. It’s this space once again that he invests in and transforms to create a true perceptual experience. The videos, utilizing the same filming approach, exist on a threshold of visibility, exploring the limits of perception.  

2013

Espace Khiasma
Les Lilas

Lundi de Phantom n°9

Ismaïl Bahri extends the reflection he began at the start of his residency and shares new videographic research focused on projections, screens, ellipses, and "blank films." 

2013

Espace Khiasma
Les Lilas

Lundi de Phantom n°6

The 6th Phantom Monday invites you into Ismaïl Bahri's studio. This new meeting with the artist will revolve around a series of videos in progress, inviting the public to enter the heart of a developing setup—where each image pulses and transforms imperceptibly.

2013

Espace Khiasma
Les Lilas

Mandrake a disparu

By referencing a magic trick, Mandrake a disparu highlights a unique space and type of illusion. Centered on the figure of the show magician — Mandrake being a symbolic name for this role — this magician-led magic, reminiscent of early cinema, is presented as a space of shared experience.

2013

Sharjah Biennal
UAE

Sharjah Biennial 11 : Re:emerge

In Re:emerge, Towards a New Cultural Cartography, curator Yuko Hasegawa proposed a Biennial that reassess the Western-centrism of knowledge in modern times and reconsiders the relationship between the Arab world, Asia, the Far East, through North Africa and Latin America.

2013

Espace Khiasma
Les Lilas

Lundi de Phantom n°3

 This first meeting with the artist in residence will be articulated around "ways of doing". Ismaïl Bahri invites Marie Doyon to mediate this process of giving and capturing between the artist and the audience. 

2012

Les Filles du Calvaire Gallery
Paris

Précipités

Each attempt does its utmost to find a point of balance for observing the world, reversing the principles to create the event on the surface and pierce its obviousness, obliterating its banality in order, in the end, to rediscover the dizziness of the infinitesimal. 

2011

Staatliche Kunsthalle Karlsruhe
Germany

Lumière noire

Selected works from painting, drawing, sculpture and video art reflect the qualities and facets of meaning that arise from the contrasting interplay of black and light. These range from the darkening to the dissolution of space, from the abstract surface value to the metaphysical charge of the image.