Biography
Since the 1960s and the 1970s, ORLAN has questioned the status of the body and the political, religious, social, and traditional pressures that are inscribed in it. Her work denounces the violence done to the body and in particular to women's bodies, and thus engages in a feminist struggle. She makes her body the privileged instrument where our own relationship to otherness is played out. This work of Orlan on the body is done in particular by the means of photography.
In 1976, for example, she walked the streets wearing a dress on which her naked body was represented. In the same period, in Portugal, she offered photos glued to wood and cut out corresponding to pieces of herself: an arm, a piece of breast, etc.
In 1977, ORLAN performed Kiss of the artist (Baiser de l'artiste), during the International Fair of Contemporary Art (FIAC ), in the Grand Palais in Paris. [2] ORLAN displayed a life-size photograph of her own nude torso, which she sat behind. The life-sized photograph was turned into a slot machine. A spectator would insert a coin and could see it descending to the groin before being awarded a kiss from the artist herself. The installation created a scandal that cost the artist her teaching position. [3]
In 1978, she created the International Symposium of the Performance in Lyon, which she animated until 1982.
Her manifesto of "carnal art" (Manifeste de l'Art Charnel) is followed by a series of surgical operations- performances that she carries out between 1990 and 1993. With this series, the body of the artist becomes a place of public debate. These surgical operations - performances were widely publicized and provoked a strong polemic, although they represent only a tiny part of her integral work.
ORLAN also explores the use of new technologies in the arts.
In 1982, with Frédéric Develay, she created the first online magazine of contemporary art, Art-Accès-Revue, on Minitel. This magazine invites international artists working in situ and/or with conceptual problems to create original works specially conceived on Minitel, by Minitel, and for Minitel. Many of the works play with the Videotex graphic style or ironically imitate Minitel services (Bernar Venet, Vera Molnár, Ben, François Morellet, Daniel Buren...) The works are accompanied by critical essays. The service also regularly gives the floor to the public. A public presentation of this database took place at the Centre Pompidou during the exhibition Les Immatériaux by Jean-François Lyotard. The Art-Access service has been distributed free of charge by the city of Metz server: MIRABEL.
In her work of the late 1990s and early 2000s, "Self-Hybridations", the artist, through digital photography and computer graphics editing software, hybridizes faces from different cultures (Native American, pre-Columbian, African).
Orlan then attempted to further expand the boundaries of contemporary art by using biotechnology to create an installation entitled Harlequin Coat made from the artist's own cells and cells of human and animal origin.
At the same time, ORLAN taught at the École nationale supérieure d'arts de Paris-Cergy. In 2005, she was awarded a one-year residency at the ISCP in New York by l'Association française d'action artistique (AFAA), and in 2006 she was invited to Los Angeles for a residency at the Getty Research Institute, the Getty Center's research laboratory.
In June 2013, she filed a complaint against Lady Gaga for plagiarism. For ORLAN, the American star, in the album Born This Way released in 2011, was too freely inspired by her "hybridizations". In addition, the beginning of the video clip of the homonymous song shows Lady Gaga made up and decapitated recalling her "Woman with head" executed in 1996. The artist sought $31.7 million in compensation. The plea hearing had been set for July 7, 2016, at the Paris high court. A first verdict was announced in the disadvantage of ORLAN, who then had to pay 20,000 euros to the singer, but the artist decided to appeal. In May 2018, the Paris Court of Appeal dismissed ORLAN by confirming the absence of the parasitic nature of the video clip incriminated. Orlan was ordered to pay 10,000 euros, as costs incurred, to Lady Gaga.
She received the Grand Prix de le-Réputation 2013, organized by Alexia Guggemos in the visual arts category, which rewards the most popular personalities on the internet, alongside Philippe Starck and Yann Arthus-Bertrand
Since October 18, 2018, ORLAN is represented in France by the Ceysson & Bénétière Gallery in Paris.
In 2019, she was a member of the jury of the Opline Prize, the first online contemporary art prize.
During the lockdown linked to the COVID-19 pandemic, she wrote her autobiography, '"Strip-Tease : tout sur ma vie, tout sur mon art" published by Gallimard in the collection Témoins de l'Art.
On November 29, 2021, she was decorated with the National Order of the Legion of Honor to the rank of Knight by the Minister of Culture Roselyne Bachelot.
The Reincarnation of Sainte- ORLAN
In 1990, Orlan began The Reincarnation of Sainte- ORLAN. It involved a series of plastic surgeries through which the artist transformed herself into elements from famous paintings and sculptures of women. As a part of her "Carnal Art" manifesto, these works were filmed and broadcast in institutions throughout the world, such as the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris and the Sandra Gehring Gallery in New York. [4]
ORLAN picked these characters, "not for the canons of beauty they represent... but rather on account of the stories associated with them."
ORLAN defines cosmetic surgery as "nomadic, mutant, shifting, differing." ORLAN has stated, "my work is a struggle against the innate, the inexorable, the programmed, Nature, DNA (which is our direct rival as far as artists of representation are concerned), and God!". [5] In an interview with Acne Paper, ORLAN stated:
I can observe my own body cut open, without suffering!... I see myself all the way down to my entrails; a new mirror stage... I can see to the heart of my lover; his splendid design has nothing to do with sickly sentimentalities... Darling, I love your spleen; I love your liver; I adore your pancreas, and the line of your femur excites me." (from Carnal Art manifesto)
"Sainte ORLAN" came from a character that I created for "Le baiser de l'artiste" from a text called "Facing a society of mothers and merchants." The first line of this text was: "At the bottom of the cross were two women, Maria and Maria Magdalena." These are two inevitable stereotypes of women that are hard to avoid: the mother and the prostitute. In "Le baiser de l'artiste" there were two faces. One was Saint ORLAN, a cutout picture of me dressed as Madonna glued onto wood. One could buy a five francs church candle and I was sitting on the other side behind the mock-up of the vending machine. One could buy a French kiss from me for the same amount of money one could buy a candle. The idea was to play on the ambivalence of the woman figure and the desire of both men and women towards those biblical and social stereotypes.
Being showcased in the Paris International Contemporary Art Fair. [6]
In the 2000s
In 2001, ORLAN orchestrated a series of filmic posters, "Le Plan du Film," with various artists and writers. She collaborated in 2008 with the Symbiotica laboratory in Australia, resulting in the bio-art installation "The Harlequin's Coat."Part of ORLAN's ongoing work includes "Suture/Hybridize/Recycle," a generative and collaborative series of clothing made from ORLAN's wardrobe and focusing on suture: the deconstruction of past clothing reconstructed into new clothing that highlights the sutures.
In June 2013, she filed a complaint against Lady Gaga. For ORLAN, the American star, in the album Born This Way released in 2011 is inspired by the artist without quoting her. The beginning of the video clip of the homonymous song shows Lady Gaga with implants similar to those of ORLAN and the face of Lady Gaga beheaded recalls the work Woman with head created in 1996. Her lawyer was asking for compensation of 31.7 million dollars. The hearing was set for July 7, 2016, at the Tribunal de la Grande Instance de Paris. A first verdict was announced against ORLAN but the artist decided to appeal. In May 2018, the Court of Appeal of Paris rejected ORLAN by confirming the absence of the parasitic nature of the video clip.
It receives the Reputation on line Prize (Grand Prix de le-réputation) in 2013, organized by the art critic Alexia Guggemos, Plastic Arts category, which rewards the most popular personalities on the Internet alongside Phillipe Starck for design and Yann Arthus-Bertrand for photography. [7]
In 2018, ORLAN created a robot in her own image, " Orlanoïde", equipped with collective and social artificial intelligence that speaks with her voice by reading texts from a text generator: presented at the Grand Palais, for the exhibition "Artists and Robots", the robot is also part of a performance entitled "Electronic and verbal striptease" and also benefits from a motion generator. It is a work in progress, currently, the developers of the Art and science gallery in Dublin are developing other capacities. [8]
In 2019, she was honored with the special prize of WOMAN OF THE YEAR, awarded by the Prince of Monte Carlo. Orlan is also appointed Professor Emeritus of the Accademia di Belle Arti di Roma. [9]
During the confinement in 2020, Orlan wrote her autobiography Strip-tease : tout sur ma vie, tout sur mon art published by Gallimard on the 3rd of June, 2021. [10]
On November 29, 2021, she was decorated with the National Order of the Legion of Honor with the rank of Knight by the Minister of Culture Roselyne Bachelot
She is represented in France by the Ceysson & Bénétière Gallery. In September and October 2024, her work titled Corps-sculpture sans visage en mouvement dansant avec son ombre n°6 (1967) was included in Ceysson & Bénétière Gallery's group exhibition, Clairvoyant. [11]
