Gerard & Kelly
Guests at Moviment
Paris-based American artists Brennan Gerard and Ryan Kelly have been working together since 2003.
With a shared background in visual arts, ballet and contemporary dance, literature and gender studies, Gerard & Kelly draw on the conceptual strategies of art and dance to address broader issues such as memory, sexuality and identity. Their explorations often unfold in a specific architectural venue, thus implicating the socio-cultural and political history of these sites in their work.
Winners of the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program in New York, they graduated from the Interdisciplinary Studio of the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA).
Their work has been presented in numerous solo exhibitions and their performances staged in several institutions: Carré d’Art – Musée d'art contemporain, Nîmes (2023) ; Galerie Marian Goodman, New York (2022) ; MAMCO, Genève (2020) ; MOCA, Los Angeles (2020) ; Festival d’automne, Paris (2017 and 2019) ; Getty Museum, Los Angeles (2019) ; Pioneer Works, New York (2018) ; Centre Pompidou, Paris (2017) ; Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2016) ; New Museum, New York (2015) ;The Kitchen, New York (2014).
Recent group exhibitions include FRAC Franche-Comté, Besançon (2022), Chicago Architecture Biennial (2017), Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2014), and Hammer Museum, Los Angeles (2014), among others.
Their works are held in the permanent collections of Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York ; LACMA – Los Angeles County Museum of Art ; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles ; FRAC Franche-Comté and Carré d'Art – Musée d'art contemporain de Nîmes.
Courtesy les artistes et la galerie Marian Goodman © Adagp Paris, 2023
Courtesy des artistes et de la galerie Marian Goodman © Adagp Paris, 2023
Gay Guerilla (2023) explores the legacy of the Afro-American queer composer Julius Eastman (1940–1990) through dance, music and architecture. By channelling the unique voice of Eastman, who died in 1990, Gerard & Kelly continue his practice, incorporating abstraction and politics in an installation brought to life by a series of performances developed specifically for the Centre Pompidou’s gallery 3.
With Samuel Akins✢, Soa de Muse, Guillaume Diop✢, Conor Hanick✳, Coleman Itzkoff✳, Awa Joannais✢, Germain Louvet✢, Enzo Saugar✢, Adam Tendler, Davóne Tines✳, Richard Valitutto, Seth Parker Woods
✢ from the Ballet de l'Opéra national de Paris
✳ Founder member of AMOC*
Continuous installation
Performances – Thursday, 29 and Friday, 30 June; Saturday, 1st July 2023 – on reservation
Discussion with Gerard & Kelly and the artists – Friday, 30 June 2023
Live broadcast of the performance – Saturday 1st July 2023 at 7pm
Concept and choreography: Gerard & Kelly
Music: Julius Eastman
Prelude to The Holy Presence of Joan d’Arc (1981); Gay Guerrilla (1979)
Installation design: Gerard & Kelly in collaboration with Simon de Dreuille
Assistant choregrapher: Julia Eichten*
Costume design: Camille Assaf
Make up: Yumiko Oka
Hair and make up: Nadeen Mateky
Lighting design: David Debrinay
Production: Vincent Brou
Stage manager: Camille Laut
Understudies: Augustin Cimbault and Marlon Thiebaux-Amaranthe
Costume assistants: Ida Maité Hahn and Lelie de Mercey
Wardrobe: Clément Bourgis
Production assistant: Pierre Tanguy-Cottin
In partnership with Opéra national de Paris
Production: & Compagnie
Coproduction: Centre Pompidou ; Festival d’Aix-en-Provence with the support of enoa and programme Europe créative de l’Union européenne ; AMOC* (American Modern Opera Company)
Residency: CN D, Centre national de la danse (Pantin); Yamaha Artists Services (New York)
With the support of DRAC Île-de-France et Adidas Paris
With the participation of Centre LGBTQI+ Paris Île-de-France
Music reproduced with the permission of G. Schirmer, Inc.
Courtesy Marian Goodman Gallery
Acknowledgements: Alexis Néons, Régie Pianos, Harlequin Europe, Bastien Mairet, Félix Touzalin, UY Studio and PERSTA
