Presentation
The Frac Île-de-France (Île-de-France Regional Contemporary Art Fund) runs a vital project to support contemporary artistic creation and accessibility to art, based on three complementary areas
- Enrichment and dissemination of its collection, mainly within the region
- Programme of exhibitions and events at Le Plateau, Les Réserves and outside the museum walls
- Outreach activities aimed at all audiences
The Frac Île-de-France project, spearheaded by Céline Poulin, who was appointed director in May 2023, responds to the challenges of today’s world, the needs of art and the requirements of the Île-de-France region. To achieve this, the programme de-hierarchises practices, exhibition spaces and geographical areas, placing its users at the centre of exhibitions, creation and the collection. On the one hand, it draws on the specific nature of the Frac Île-de-France, a multi-site structure that allows it to operate in different locations, including the Plateau in Paris, the Réserves in Romainville, secondary schools and a network of partners in the cultural, associative and medico-social fields. On the other hand, by promoting co-creation, amateur practice and direct encounters with artists, while opening up the collection to participation, in line with cultural rights and popular education. Feeling welcome and allowed to walk through the door is the main challenge for such a structure. The exhibition model is therefore evolving to make the Frac Île-de-France a real place of life and research, focusing above all on exchange, educational practice and support for young artists. The entire programme is intended to be a shared and polyphonic story, co-constructed with the teams, artists, partners and audiences, based on their uses, the pooling of resources and respect for them.
Funded by the Île-de-France Region, the French State and the City of Paris, the Frac Île-de-France is an organisation associated with the Île-de-France Region, governed by the 2016 law on freedom of creation and by the 2017 decree and order relating to the Frac label.
It is a member of the Platform, TRAM, Grand Belleville and BLA! networks.
The collection
Open to the diversity of contemporary artistic practices, the Frac Île-de-France collection, comprising over 2,200 works, is now developing along four main lines:
- Acquire works resulting from collaborative and socially engaged practices, particularly those addressing disability issues (find out more about accessibility at Frac);
- Acquire accessible works or works for everyday use, etc.: protocols to be activated, furniture, video games, board games, works dedicated to specific senses (touch, smell, etc.), small-format works for the Flash collection project;
- Develop the acquisition of works dealing with contemporary imagery (videos, photographs, works co-created with AI, etc.);
- Develop the acquisition of emerging practices in Île-de-France, where the artistic pool is abundant, in order to support young creators.
Le Plateau
Experimentation, production, co-creation and support for contemporary creation Le Plateau – an exhibition space inaugurated in 2002 on the initiative of local residents seeking to reorient a residential construction programme in this neighbourhood of Paris’s 19th arrondissement – is a must-see venue for contemporary art in France.
Eight exhibitions are organised at Le Plateau each year:
- An exhibition, solo or duo, engaging with audiences and social issues
- A collective territorial, transdisciplinary and transhistorical exhibition with a section also presented at Les Réserves and also displayed offsite.
- Six Project Room exhibitions taking place in the last room of Le Plateau. The Project Room, Frac's forward-looking and experimental space, offers French and foreign artists, preferably but not exclusively those living in the Île-de-France region, the opportunity to present their research projects, dissertations, grants or residencies. This responsive and flexible programme is developed in dialogue with key organisations supporting creativity, particularly young artists, as well as art schools and universities in the Paris region and internationally.
- Le Plateau has a space for open practice to integrate amateur use of the venue and also offers a full programme of events, meetings, performances and workshops.
Les Réserves
Preserving and activating the collection, engaging it with the emerging scene and opening it up to participation. In 2021, the Frac Île-de-France acquired a building in Romainville, whose main function is to house its collection. 1,600 m² are thus devoted to the conservation and management of the works, in order to optimise their dissemination throughout the Île-de-France region. This building showcases the work carried out with and around the collection, from the works that constitute it to all the professions involved in its conservation, management and dissemination.
The Réserves also offer 450 m² of exhibition space open to the public and host three exhibitions per year:
- Two exhibitions creating collection narratives or establishing a dialogue between works in the collection and emerging creations, in connection with contemporary issues.
- A transdisciplinary and transhistorical regional exhibition (with one section presented at Le Plateau and another outside its walls)
- Les Réserves have a space for open practice to integrate amateur use of the venue and also offer a full programme of events, meetings, performances and workshops.
Offsite
Co-construction, artist presence and long-term work with local partners
The collection is displayed in a variety of partner venues in the Paris region, as well as in France and abroad, including heritage sites, community organisations, public spaces in partnership with local authorities, institutional venues not dedicated to the visual arts, and schools, where visitors can engage directly with the works (the Flash collection travelling exhibition offers a unique opportunity an introduction to contemporary art for secondary school pupils, with the works displayed within the schools themselves), with the active participation of the artists.
Each year, the regional project combines works from the collection with other works around a theme interpreted, depending on the context, by guest curators from across the Île-de-France region.
Educational department
Our outreach activities – in collaboration with the visitor services department – are designed to offer a comprehensive programme for all audiences. These include long-term partnerships with schools and universities, as well as tailored programmes for different audiences at Le Plateau, Les Réserves and beyond, encouraging a sensitive approach to the works through exchange and dialogue.
To bring the relationship with art to life, spaces for free practice and independent experimentation have been set up at the Réserves and the Plateau, as close as possible to the works.
Reaching out to all audiences also means continuing to improve accessibility and inclusivity, both within and outside the museum, with the implementation of new tools and the design of initiatives in partnership with the medical and social sectors.
Finally, in line with this desire to encourage participation, a new project entitled Collection partagée (Shared collection) involves a group of secondary school pupils in the selection of works proposed to the Frac’s acquisition committee.
