BAD TIMING. Théo Mercier

The magnificent spaces of Villa Medici host the artist and director Théo Mercier, a former fellow of the French Academy in 2013-2014, who returns after ten years to present his sculptures solo exhibition.

BAD TIMING winds through the architecture of the elegant building, between interiors and exteriors, with a corpus of works that links past, present and future, forcing the doors of time, museums and open-air dumps in Rome to propose a heterogeneous, humorous and revolutionary mix.

On the forecourt of the Villa, a 'rain' of cars lies like birds with wounded bodies, while further on, a series of chairs modelled in bronze, abandoned, deformed, crushed or torn, melt in the sun. The exhibition rooms that lead to the ancient cistern welcome the dystopian representation of some hybrid structures of used appliances and amputated marble sculptures, coming from the collections of Villa Medici, bound by different shibari techniques.

On 9 and 10 September, the exhibition comes alive with NECROTEMPO, a performance specially created for the Academy, featuring young artists from the experimental and musical scene, realised with the support of Hermès and in collaboration with the Short Theater of Rome, the festival in which the French artist presents his show Radio Vinci Park together with the performer, choreographer and dancer François Chaignaud on 16 and 17 September.