Les Immatériaux or How to Construct the History of Exhibitions

Abstract

The 1985 exhibition Les Immatériaux – curated by French philosopher Jean-François Lyotard and Thierry Chaput at the Centre Pompidou in Paris – is cast as a pre-1989 event that foresaw the advent of globalisation, as a melancholic anticipation of the changing role of contemporary art in this era of accelerated exchange, and as a moment in a history of exhibitions in the wake of what was called, until recently, aesthetics.