MIAMI BEACH - (October 4, 2005) - This exhibition is comprised of major works from the FNAC (Fondation National d'Art Contemporain/ National Foundation for Contemporary Art), the most significant collection of contemporary art in France. Begun two hundred years ago by the French government to bring attention to living artists, it now consists of about 80,000 works of art, 20,000 that have been acquired in the last twenty-five years.

FNAC Curators Catherine Francblin and Jean-Marc Prevost selected nineteen works primarily from the nineties onward. Media represented includes video, drawing, painting, photography, and large-scale installations.

Each cutting edge work in this exhibition experiments with new ways of critical perception. For example, French artist Xavier Veilhan explores the translation of virtual images into three-dimensional objects through his lightworks by applying virtual-to-physical translations to the process to moving images. Each bulb of Veilhan's lightworks serves as a single pixel from digital film creating an electric collage that is comprised of over 1,000 lightbulbs. The grander scale and increased distance between the image and the spectator introduces a new perspective on the subject matter that results in a new way of seeing.

Swiss-born artist Thomas Hirschhorn creates monumental installations out of found objects and common materials such as tape, plastic and cardboard. His seemingly haphazard assemblages communicate ambivalence and fragility. His intention is not to recreate environments, rather to lend a different "energy" and an alternative "feel" to the sense of place and idea. Hirschhorn deals with issues such as poverty, political oppression, violation of human rights, war and pollution.

Artists in the exhibition include Pierre Bismuth, Jean-Marc Bustamante, Claude Closky, Malachi Farrell, Thomas Hirschhorn, Pierre Huyghe, Anne-Marie Jugnet and Alain Clairet, Bertrand Lavier, Orlan, Alain Séchas, Barthélémy Toguo, and Xavier Veilhan.

On Saturday November 5 at 3 :00PM at the Bass Museum of Art please join us for Behind the Scenes: An Afternoon with the Artists, a panel discussion with artists Anne-Marie Junet, Alain Clairet and Malachi Farrell. The genesis and evolution of their respective works will be discussed. The moderator for the discussion will be Dr. William Jeffett, Curator of Exhibitions at the Salvidor Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida.

This exhibition is generously sponsored by the Funding Arts Network, the Cultural Services Consulate General of France in Miami, the French Ministry of Culture, the Centre National des Arts Plastiques, the France Florida Foundation for the Arts, the Association Francaise d'Action Artisique, the City of Miami Beach Cultural Affairs Council, the Miami-Dade County Cultural Affairs Council, and Friends of the Bass Museum.