Conference | Gaëlle Périot

Ephemeral works such as theatrical performances are difficult to exhibit in museums, which compromises their transmission as works of art. The case of Futurist and Dada performances is interesting to study because exhibitions of these early 20th-century avant-garde movements generally lead to a decline in their theatrical dimension in favor of highlighting plastic works (drawings, paintings, sculptures, etc.). Max Ernst's reaction to the Dada exhibition in Düsseldorf in 1958 illustrates this difficulty: "A Dada exhibition. Another one! Why do they all want to turn Dada into a museum piece? Dada was a bomb. Can you imagine someone, nearly half a century after a bomb exploded, collecting the shrapnel, gluing it together, and displaying it? " The aim of this conference is to examine the status of these fragments, which are objects, texts, and images directly linked to an explosive artistic activity: are they just dead things? Do they have the power to convey the brilliance of a theatrical work?

Gaëlle Périot is a lecturer and researcher in aesthetics and philosophy of art at the Victor Basch Center of the Faculty of Arts at Sorbonne  University. Her research focuses on the performing arts and the transmission of ephemeral works in the 20th and 21st centuries. She co-edited the collective work Répéter, refaire, reprendre. Enjeux artistiques et esthétiques (PUR, 2025) and is the author of the monograph Eclats de l’éphémère, Futurisme et Dada à l’épreuve du temps agonal (1909-2009), published by Mimésis in 2025.

 Discover our 2025-26 lecture series

 This lecture series is a co-production of the Musées nationaux du XXe siècle des Alpes-Maritimes and the Direction de la Culture de Université Côte d’Azur, in partnership with the CRHI - Centre de Recherches en Histoire des Idées, and with the support of the association des amis du musée national Marc Chagall.

Photo : © DR, 2025