Tino Sehgal: KISS

Internationally-acclaimed artist Tino Sehgal presents Kiss, an art experience that is completed by the visitor, as his first exhibit in an American museum, on view at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA), Chicago, from October 7 to December 30, 2007. Referencing a number of historical and contemporary sculptures entitled Kiss, this work is not a physical object, but a situation performed by two people dancing a set of instructions created by Sehgal.

During museum hours, two dancers enact a choreographed loop of perpetual, slow-moving forms. It is this close interaction between the couples that generates a visceral connection with the viewers, drawing them into a subtle engagement with their own personal experience of intimacy.

Located in the MCA's fourth-floor Ruth Horwich Lake Gallery, Kiss is visible from the moment a visitor enters the museum. It is situated within the Collection Highlights exhibition where it shares a historical thread of ideas and images. Kiss resonates with many of the themes raised in the collection exhibition, as it asks how the visitor experiences, defines, and interacts with art and with the museum. Rather than passively regarding a static work, Kiss generates a real connection with the viewer in the very moment of engagement with art that comes to life in their presence.

Known for challenging his audience with intriguing and innovative work, Tino Sehgal believes that art is the most efficient way of involving the public in a discussion of politics and values. Because Sehgal’s work is meant to be experienced as it is enacted, the artist does not allow documentation of any kind, and at the conclusion of the exhibition nothing physical remains.

Born in London in 1976, Sehgal studied dance and political economics and is currently based in Berlin, Germany. His work has been presented at the Venice Biennale, the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, and the Institute of Contemporary Arts and the Tate Britain in London. He was recently nominated in 2006 for the Hugo Boss Prize at the Guggenheim Museum in New York. Kiss is curated by Tricia Van Eck, Curatorial Coordinator and Curator of Artists’ Books.

Tino Sehgal: KISS