Ernest Pignon-Ernest Biography
Nice, France 1942
An established French artist, Ernest Pignon-Ernest has been doing performance and installation work on and around city walls for thirty years. He is obsessed with images of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and has transferred paintings, drawings, and serigraphs onto city walls and telephone booths. These images become part of the urban architecture, accepted by the population, and protected against deterioration.
Pignon-Ernest disdains art created for exhibitions and museums, and describes his work as a way to capture the essence of a place. It is based in history and memories, as well as in light and space. He inscribes an image created in his studio, usually installing the work at night.
He feeds off of a cultural heritage that mixes the pagan and the Christian, and makes reference to famous artists, particularly Caravaggio.
To distinguish himself from artist Ernest Pignon, whose identical name provoked confusion when they once shared an exhibition, he repeats his first name after his surname.
Selected Installations
2003 - Memory of the Algerian War. Maurice Audin, Algeria.
2002 - Soweto-Warwick-Durban, South Africa.
1996 - Behind the Glass. Silhouettes painted on telephone. Paris and Lyon, France.
1988-1995 - Naples I, II, III, IV. Naples, Italy.
1984 - The Aborigines. Jardin des Plantes, Paris, France.
1979 - Expulsions. Paris, France.
1975 - On Abortion. Paris, Nice and Tours, France.
1971 - 100th Anniversary of the Paris Commune. Paris, France.
1966 - In Situ d?Albion.