The Causes of Things

(© Alexandre Singh, Assembly Instructions (The Pledge – Alfredo Arias), 2011)

The Brussels art scene is becoming increasingly French. Our neighbours to the south are often in a majority in art education; more and more French gallery-owners are opening branches in Brussels; and collectors are settling in ever greater numbers in Ukkel/Uccle and Elsene/Ixelles as they flee François Hollande’s wealth tax. And right now the Centrale for Contemporary Art has gone all blue, white, and red too: it has invited the French Centre National des Arts Plastiques to join forces with it in putting together an exhibition. The vast majority of the artists are French, with sonorous names such as Saâdane Afif, Claire Fontaine, and Aurélien Froment. Their work is supplemented by a few major international figures such as Jimmie Durham and Bruce Nauman. “The Causes of Things” is – rather loosely – structured around the (often mysterious) sources of the artistic creative process. The exhibition opens with a presentation of the artist as director: a handsome ensemble by Alexandre Singh, a leading artist, whose series of framed black and white drawings and collages pay a tribute to the theatre director Alfredo Arias. We also liked Olivier Dollinger’s video, in which a mime artist attempts to represent a number of abstract paintings.

The black and white photographs in which Jean-Luc Verna strikes a number of poses (some of them with a basis in art history), on the other hand, are more in the order of kitsch. The second section of the exhibition has a more spacious feel and contains a number of impressive ensembles. Yann Sérandour reworks an abstract work by Yves Klein that depicts emptiness, while Ceal Floyer presents a shopping list in which every item – e.g. toothpaste, basmati rice, and witloof/chicons – is white. The work, which is part of a series, was executed on behalf of the artist in the Delhaize on boulevard Anspachlaan. August 2007, an empty transparency by Mario García Torres, looks pure white at first sight but has scratches from spending a month in the artist’s trouser pocket. Céline Duval and Etienne Chambaud’s work is not so much about the origins of the world as about destruction. Both set about their personal archives: Chambaud paints over everything in black, while Duval’s video shows her setting fire to her splendidly organised documentation material. The theme of the exhibition may be rather broadly interpreted, but the presence of lots of fascinating artists more than makes up for that.

The Causes of Things > 9/6, di/ma/Tu > zo/di/Su 10.30 > 18.00, €4/5, CENTRALE FOR CONTEMPORARY ART, Sint-Katelijneplein 44 place Sainte-Catherine, Brussel/Bruxelles, www.centrale-art.be