Louise Bourgeois. Extrême tension

Presented by Centre Pompidou and the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, an exhibition dedicated to the graphic work of Louise Bourgeois will bring together the two institutions’ collections for the first time. It is also the first exhibition dedicated to the artist in a Parisian public institution since 2008.

Bourgeois moved to New York in 1938 and discovered printmaking in Atelier 17 with Stanley William Hayter – a technique that would become an essential part of her entire body of work, along with drawing. Printmaking, drawing and sculpture fed into one another; words joined images, movements were repeated like rituals.

The exhibition opens with her 1942 Self-Portrait, then presents her first prints from the 1940s, including the foundational portfolio He Disappeared into Complete Silence (1947): short texts and printed images, between absurd tales and mental architecture.

Then come the labyrinth drawings with layers of black lines, evoking networks of nerves and muscular fibres ; followed by  anthropomorphic architectures like La Femme-Maison (Fallen Woman) and organic forms, where anatomy and plants combine. 

In the centre of the exhibition, the monumental Extreme Tension (2007) combines print, drawing and handwriting. The 11 large sheets deliver a poignant testimony on the ageing body, pain and existential anxiety. In direct resonance, the huge plates of Turning Inwards (2007) are presented to a French audience for the first time. 

The exhibition closes with a series of works in red ink and fabric dye – the red of flesh, blood, embrace and motherhood – with pregnant figures that could be male or female, blurring the lines between genders.