‘For where we are we are not’, workshop at Villa Noailles is a project of the Dutch Art Institute (DAI).Villa Noailles is located at the highest point of Hyères, in the hills above the Mediterranean coast. The villa is designed by Robert Mallet-Stevens as a winter resort. Mallet-Stevens experience as a set designer for films is betrayed by the garden wall: openings resembling film stills offer spectacular views of the surrounding landscape and the Mediterranean sea below.
The aristocratic couple Charles and Marie-Laure de Noailles, who commissioned the villa invited countless leading figures of the avant-garde to stay and work in the villa. Amongst them were visual artists, architects, interior designers, writers, musicians and film producers. Man Ray uses the house as a setting for this film Les Mystères du Château du Dé and Jean Cocteau uses it in his film Le sang d'un poète. Salvador Dalí and Luis Buñuel stay in the villa to write the script for l’Age d’Or. Gabriël Guévrékian designs the cubist garden that houses sculptures by Lipchitz, Brancusi and Giacometti. Eileen Grey designs a wall carpet for the villa. The Dutch avant-garde is represented by Theo van Doesburg, Sybold van Ravenstein and Mondrian.
Nowadays the villa houses a cultural institute that brings together architecture, fashion, visual arts and film.
Workshopleaders: Margret Wibmer (visual artist) and Rik Fernhout (DAI).
www.dutchartinstitute.nl
The duration of the video is 5.35 minutes
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