For “They Acquired Time: YOU BELONG TO THE CITY,” Alvaro Barrington takes over Thaddaeus Ropac Paris Pantin, remodeling the luminous ex-factory constructing right into a three-part set up. A monumental self-portrait of his years rising up in New York, the exhibition invitations the customer into an exploration of the artist’s private and cultural reminiscence: what Barrington describes as “a love letter to the nyc streetscape of my youth within the type of an artwork set up.”

Barrington fills the gallery with monumental handmade storefronts, made up of shutters in numerous mediums with rooms tucked behind chainmail curtains by which he installs his new sequence of works. He relates the set up general to the “magic” arcades of Nineteenth-century Paris, as described by Walter Benjamin in his 1927–40 work of cultural criticism The Arcades Challenge, which shaped the prototype for the trendy storefront. Like within the memorable opening scene of the 1961 Blake Edwards-directed movie Breakfast at Tiffany’s, by which Audrey Hepburn’s Holly Golightly seems longingly on the Tiffany’s window shows because the solar rises on fifth Avenue, Barrington encourages guests to the exhibition to expertise this sense of anticipation and aspiration for themselves as they take a look at his new works.

“Streets are the dwelling place of the collective. […] Greater than anyplace else, the road reveals itself within the arcade because the furnished and acquainted inside of the lots.”
—Walter Benjamin, The Arcades Challenge, 1927–40

The exhibition unfolds throughout three rooms or “chapters.” Each represents completely different features of the artist’s experiences rising up in New York because the son of Grenadian and Haitian migrant staff, channelled by means of each the imagery of his personal private historical past and thru references which might be a part of the collective consciousness. The primary, which he calls CHAINGING Room, pertains to his recollections of being a teen in New York Metropolis, standing in entrance of closed store shutters at daybreak ready eagerly for them to open so he may change his garments to replicate how he wished to current himself to the world that day. The second chapter—THE BLOCK—in the meantime, phases a stroll by means of Soho or alongside fifth Avenue, each by means of the buildings that line both facet of the streets and thru the collision of characters that the artist paints. “I bounce between my very own biography and people of individuals round me,” explains the artist.

Barrington is regularly increasing his constellation of references, inspirations and communities, whereas all the time acknowledging the formative position of artwork historical past in his apply. The brand new works on view replicate a cross-polli-nation of many such influences. Barrington channels the bather, an everlasting theme in artwork historical past which he connects to Paul Cézanne, Pablo Picasso and Édouard Manet, amongst others, by means of hip-hop icons, basketball gamers and movie stars. His new work embrace reworkings of David LaChapelle’s {photograph} of Tupac mendacity within the tub draped in jewels, and of Holly Golightly in her bathrobe. This refrain of figures comes collectively to inform the story of Barrington’s New York Metropolis, the place sexuality, vogue and self-presentation meld with concepts of battle and hope. Because the artist says: “That’s what hip-hop is.”

“All of a sudden you’re afraid, and also you don’t know what you’re afraid of. Don’t you ever get that feeling? […] After I get it, the one factor that does any good is to leap right into a cab and go to Tiffany’s. […] Nothing very dangerous may occur to you there.”
—Holly Golightly, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, 1961

The exhibition culminates in a chapter Barrington entitles THE GARDEN: a play on phrases that brings collectively the excesses of the streets surrounding Madison Sq. Backyard and Hieronymus Bosch’s The Backyard of Earthly Delights (1490–1510). Devoted to Barrington’s celebrated Basketball Work, this last area faucets into the social significance of the game, each to the artist throughout his personal Brooklyn upbringing, and extra broadly throughout marginalised communities. Reflecting the recollections and influences that come collectively within the exhibition, Barrington’s most up-to-date works introduce new media to his established materials language, bringing collectively components that evoke luxurious, like intricately carved wooden, patterned leather-based given to him by the acclaimed luxurious model Alaïa and Tiffany-inspired stained glass lights, with laundry luggage, milk bottles, concrete, cardboard and yarn: non-traditional objects and supplies that reference his private and cultural historical past.

Aspiration and risk, particularly amongst Black and marginalised communities, has all the time been on the coronary heart of Barrington’s apply. Via recreating his personal experiences of gazing into store home windows in New York Metropolis earlier than college, the artist encourages guests to the exhibition to take a look at his works with the identical sense of longing and marvel he as soon as felt. In doing so, the artist relays a story about not having and wanting, but in addition concerning the energy of the objects we want and eat to provide us a way of safety, hope, or, as Barrington says, “participation.”

at Thaddaeus Ropac, Paris
till January 27, 2024