Énormément bizarre - Sammlung Jean Chatelus

group exhibition

Jean Chatelus, who passed away in 2021 at the age of 82, was a Lyon-born historian and lecturer at the Sorbonne. Throughout his life, he amassed a unique collection, driven more by an impulse to accumulate than by a traditional collector’s approach. Comprising nearly 400 pieces—sculptures, installations, paintings, photographs, drawings, votive and vernacular objects—the collection explores themes of the body, death, and the fleeting nature of life.

Presented almost in its entirety, the collection reflects Chatelus’s evolving tastes: from an early fascination with Surrealism and repurposed objects, to a later focus on body art. It also reveals his keen interest in non-Western ethnographic artifacts, folk traditions, and the works of contemporary art’s outsiders and enfant terribles.
Besides the works from Hermann Nitsch, this incredible collection includs pieces by Cindy Sherman, Mike Kelley, Christian Boltanski, Yayoi Kusama, Michel Journiac, Daniel Spoerri, Robert Filliou, Nam June Paik, Joana Vasconcelos, Andres Serrano, and Wim Delvoye.

“Énormément bizarre – Sammlung Jean Chatelus”, donated by Fondation Antoine de Galbert will be on disply from March 26 – Junie 30, 2025 at the Centre Pompidou Paris (gallery 3, level 1).