Société Réaliste
Société Réaliste is an artistic cooperative founded in 2004 by Ferenc Gróf (1972) and Jean-Baptiste Naudy (1982).
Central to their activities is the exploration, subversion and decontruction of the specific devices of visual communication that have been developed and employed by institutions, governments and rulers, i.e., the representatives of power – in the fields of religion, politics, culture, art and finance – so as to position themselves.
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By exploring the representative and aesthetic roles of these agencies – including signs, logos, maps, symbols, typefaces, landmarks, emblems, statues or even buildings – in complex contexts of much broader time and space, the artists place them in a new light in the form of a “political cabinet of curiosities”, a critical, narrative implementation of design.
Through subtle comparisons, extrapolations, statistical interpretations and superimpositions, their works reveal historical developments and “trends”, and produce a set of tools for understanding the contemporary world.
Several solo exhibitions have been devoted to them : at the Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume (2011), the Ludwig Museum (Budapest, 2012), the Museum of Contemporary Art, Bucharest (2012), Pexclamation, New York (2013), Salon de Vortex (Athens, 2013) and Akbank Sanat (Istanbul, 2011).
They have also participated in the biennials of Istanbul (2009), Helsinki (2014), Lyon (2009), Shanghai (2012) and have been exhibited in several major foreign institutions such as the Budapest Ludwig Museum in 2012, the Contemporary Art Museum in Bucharest in 2011, the Wroclaw Contemporary Museum in 2012, the Dunaujvaros Institute of Contemporary Art in 2012, the Sheila C. Johnson Desing Center in New York in 2012, the Leon MUSAC in 2012, the TOP Contemporary Art Center in Shanghai in 2011, the University of Maryland Baltimore, Center for Art, Design, and Visual Culture, and the Pistoletto Foundation in Biella in 2010, etc.
Recent solo exhibitions include Tender Pixels (London), P! (New York), Salon de Vortex (Athens) and Tranzit.ro (Cluj). For FIAC 2013, their monumental work U.N. Camouflage, made up of 193 flags, was installed on the Solferino footbridge by Galerie Jérôme Poggi, which also devoted a monographic stand to them at the Grand Palais.
Works
Exhibitions at the Gallery
The First Stone
October 13 - December 2, 2023
Rainbow Gravity
June 20 – July 18, 2020
The Border is a State of Mind
October 13 – November 16, 2018
Matérialisme Hystérique
October 18 - November 29, 2014
