Philippe Parreno’s Playlist. A concert for piano and Marquees by Mikhail Rudy

On Wednesday 27 January 2016 at 9pm Pirelli HangarBicocca presents Philippe Parreno’s Playlist, a special musical event in the framework of the Public Program dedicated to Philippe Parreno’s exhibition “Hypothesis” curated by Andrea Lissoni. Internationally renowned pianist Mikhail Rudy plays a grand piano inside the exhibition space, bringing the entire installation of the Marquees to life through a selection of musical pieces chosen together with Parreno himself.
On this occasion, for one evening only, visitors get the chance to experience a unique conjunction between live music and visual art: Philippe Parreno’s Playlist is both a piano concert and a new experiment in activating the works in “Hypothesis”. As the outcome of very close collaboration between Rudy and Parreno, it marks the culmination of a dialogue that has spanned several years.
The program for the concert — during which the audience is free to walk around within the space — which lasts approximately 80 minutes, is a selection of pieces based in part on the repertoire of great twentieth-century Russian composers of whom Rudy is one of the greatest interpreters, and in part on the works of the most significant experimental composers of contemporary music including John Cage, Morton Feldman, György Ligeti: a repertoire that turns up among the many musical references in the artist’s shows, “Hypothesis” included. Music is one of the key languages in Philippe Parreno’s work, and a fundamental element around which the various parts of the exhibition at Pirelli HangarBicocca unfold.

Philippe Parreno’s Playlist

• Alexander Scriabin, Guirlandes et Flamme sombres op. 73; 5 Preludes op. 74; Vers la flamme op. 72
• John Cage, In a Landscape
• György Ligeti, Musica Ricercata n° 1 et 2
• Arvo Pärt, Für Alina
• György Kurtág, Perpetuum Mobile
• Bach/Kurtag, Actus Tragicus (for two pianos)
• Christoph Willibald Gluck, “Dance of the Blessed Spirits” from Orpheus and Eurydice
  
• Richard Wagner, “Death of Isolde” from Tristan and Isolde
  
• Olivier Messiaen, Vision de l’Amen (for two pianos)
• Igor Stravinskij, pieces from Petrushka
• Morton Feldman, Palais de Mari (with the film Marylin)

Born in Russia in 1953, Mikhail Rudy studied at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow. In 1975, he won first prize at the Marguerite Long Competition. Having settled in France, where he applied for political asylum, Mikhail Rudy made his prestigious debut performing Beethoven’s Triple Concerto with Mstislav Rostropovich and Isaac Stern, to celebrate the 90th birthday of Marc Chagall. His career then took on an international dimension as he played with the world’s greatest orchestras, including the Berlin Philharmoniker, as well as its most famous conductors, like Lorin Maazel, Herbert von Karajan and Michael Tilson Thomas. In 1989, he returned to his native Russia and went on numerous international tours with the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic. He also founded the Saint-Riquier Festival, of which he was Artistic Director for twenty years. Mikhail’s artistic curiosity has led him to explore different artistic genres and undertake a number of innovative projects. He has conceived and directed a film based on Kandinsky’s staged version of Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an Exhibition”. He has also collaborated with several artists from different disciplines, among them the cult animation filmmakers the Quay Brothers (on the project Metamorphosis), and legendary techno musician Jeff Mills (on the recent album When Time Splits, recorded live at the Louvre). In 2013 Rudy collaborated with Philippe Parreno for the exhibition “Anywhere, Anywhere Out of the World” in Palais de Tokyo in Paris, and in summer 2015 he played during Parreno’s exhibition H {N)Y P N(Y} OSIS at Park Avenue Armory, New York.