Iván Argote, Sciences Po Paris
Sciences Po appointed a team comprising Sogelym Dixence, Wilmotte & Associés, Moreau Kusunoki and Pierre Bortolussi to manage the redevelopment of their Parisian campus. Working alongside architects, Manifesto managed the commission and production of an artwork by Iván Argote.
With its international scope and pioneering educational innovations, this project showcases its dual heritage: the Hôtel de l’Artillerie, with its 300 years of history, and Sciences Po, which celebrated its 150th anniversary in 2021-2022. After its opening in 2022, the new site of the Paris campus located at 1 Saint Thomas welcomes students, professors and researchers, along with sculptures by a young Colombian artist, Iván Argote, who was chosen by a jury panel in September 2020 to provide contemporary creations for this historic setting. Working with a group of students, Argote has begun to create a series of symbolic and meaningful artworks, composed of benches and sculptures.
Manifesto supervised the project within the consortium responsible for the redevelopment of 1 Saint Thomas. Manifesto proposed a list of artists, based on Sciences Po’s own specifications. Two of these artists were shortlisted in January 2020 by a jury panel including Frédéric Mion, Director of Sciences Po, Laurence Bertrand-Dorléac, Lecturer and Member of the Prix Sciences Po for Contemporary Art, Clara-Lou Sinard, Chair of the Arts Bureau, Christophe Condamin, CEO of Sogelym Dixence, and Jean-Michel Wilmotte, Architect.
The jury selected Iván Argote's composition and Manifesto ensured the production of this perennial commission, four benches and a large concrete arch installed during the summer of 2021 in the courtyards of the block.
Manifesto set up writing workshops with the artist and students from Sciences Po Paris, in order to create inscriptions on the sculptures installed in the school.
A Colombian artist from a family involved in trade unionism and politics, Iván Argote trained at the National University of Colombia and then at the Beaux-Arts in Paris. His artworks utilize different mediums; video, performance, computers, sculpture and painting. Argote produces his compositions on the street, on public transport, in museums and other public places. Through his work, Ivan Argote proposes questions about living together and the presence of power and history in our daily lives. With a certain joie de vivre and a lot of humor, he seeks to criticize our passivity, in a spirit of non-resignation and rebellion.