{"id":541079,"date":"2026-07-09T13:56:13","date_gmt":"2026-07-09T13:56:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/541079\/"},"modified":"2026-07-09T13:56:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T13:56:13","slug":"gerard-kelly-turn-villa-benkemoun-back-into-a-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/541079\/","title":{"rendered":"gerard & kelly turn villa benkemoun back into a home"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gerard & Kelly transform Villa Benkemoun into a living clock<\/p>\n

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During the opening week of Les Rencontres d\u2019Arles<\/a>, American artists Gerard & Kelly present On Time, a site-specific project conceived for Villa Benkemoun that temporarily returns \u00c9mile Sala\u2019s 1970s organic residence to everyday life. The activation marks the latest chapter in the Paris-based artists\u2019 ongoing exploration of modernist architecture, following interventions at landmarks including Le Corbusier\u2019s Villa Savoye, Eileen Gray\u2019s E-1027, Mies van der Rohe\u2019s Farnsworth House, Philip Johnson\u2019s Glass House, and the R.M. Schindler House. At Villa Benkemoun, however, the focus shifts from architectural icon<\/a> to lived experience, asking how a house that has become a museum <\/a>might once again function as a home<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Conceived around their performance Clockwork, Gerard & Kelly\u2019s On Time centers on the presence of two performers who sleep inside the villa at night and activate it during the day. At scheduled moments, they move through its rooms, speaking fragments of memory, dancing, and tracing choreographed paths that respond to the spatial logic of the building. Over the course of four days, the house itself becomes a clock, with bodies and voices serving as its moving hands.<\/p>\n

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For curator Rapha\u00ebl Giannesini, the project grew directly from Villa Benkemoun\u2019s evolving identity. Invited by Brigitte Benkemoun, daughter of the family who commissioned the house, he has been developing an artistic program that positions the villa as a place capable of generating new forms of inhabitation. After an initial exhibition celebrating the villa\u2019s history through archival objects and documents, he sought a radically different approach.\u2018This house has become a museum, but how can we get back to the original house? After all, it\u2019s a place to live,\u2019 Giannesini tells designboom.<\/p>\n

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all images by Pauline Scotto Di Cesare | creative and executive production by Bureau Future. \u00a9 Adagp Paris, 2026<\/p>\n

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when a museum becomes a home again<\/p>\n

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Gerard & Kelly intentionally remove many of the existing objects from the interior, allowing the villa\u2019s architecture to stand out. The spaces come alive by movement, gesture, and everyday rituals. The performers become temporary inhabitants whose personal memories intertwine with those embedded within the house itself, blurring the distinction between lived experience and historical recollection.<\/p>\n

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That approach resonates with the artists\u2019 broader practice<\/a>, which examines the relationship between choreography and modern architecture. While previous works unfolded within canonical houses closely associated with figures such as Le Corbusier or Mies van der Rohe, Villa Benkemoun presents a different proposition. Designed by French architect \u00c9mile Sala in the early 1970s, the residence carries the accumulated traces of family life alongside its architectural ambitions, offering what Giannesini describes as \u2018a lived modernism.\u2019<\/p>\n

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the performance extends beyond the house into Villa Benkemoun\u2019s curving outdoor spaces<\/p>\n

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where architecture keeps time<\/p>\n

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The building informs the performance. Sala conceived the villa through flowing curves that connect interior spaces with the landscape, while its distinctive tower introduces a vertical axis that draws attention to the passing of time. Giannesini suggests that the house is \u2018more a subject of time than of space,\u2019 noting that the performers effectively become the clock\u2019s hands as they circulate through the architecture. Their movements are not imposed upon the villa but respond to its geometry, rhythms, and circulation. As the curator puts it, \u2018the villa itself is a dancing villa.\u2019<\/p>\n

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Alongside the performances, Gerard & Kelly introduce a handful of works that echo the project\u2019s focus on time, from opposing digital clocks to a score drawing and D\u00e9fense de rire (2025), a wall lamp that illuminates each passing hour. Spread across the villa, the interventions become part of the experience. Over three days, the villa is inhabited once again. Performers sleep there at night and return to its spaces throughout the day, tracing familiar routes and everyday gestures that bring a different pace to the house during the opening week of Les Rencontres d\u2019Arles.<\/p>\n

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\u00c9mile Sala\u2019s flowing architecture frames the performers during On Time<\/p>\n

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Gerard & Kelly activate Villa Benkemoun<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Gerard & Kelly transform Villa Benkemoun into a living clock \u00a0 During the opening week of Les Rencontres…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":541080,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[74933,307,304,305,306,308,93,61,60,109985],"class_list":["post-541079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-architectural-icons","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-artsdesign","tag-design","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-les-rencontres-de-la-photographie-darles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/541079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=541079"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/541079\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/541080"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=541079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=541079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=541079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}