Fondation Pernod Ricard marks a milestone with 40 international art essays published in new anthology
Top: Yto Barrada, Ferme Pedagogique—Tomatoes, 2011. C-print, 123.8 cm × 123.8 cm. Courtesy of Pace Gallery; Sfeir-Semler Gallery, Hamburg, Beirut; and Galerie Polaris, Paris. Bottom: Christian Bertin at his studio in Martinique, with La Jungle (cette foule qui ne sait pas faire foule). © ADAGP. Photo: Robert Charlotte, 2025.
PARIS.—
The Fondation Pernod Ricard announces two new essay commissions published on its editorial platform and the publication of a book compiling the first forty commissions from the TextWork programme.
TextWork #1–40: Critical Perspectives on the French Art Scene: 40 Artists by 40 International Voices
Since its inception in 2017, TextWork has created a distinctive space for dialogue between writing and contemporary art practices by fostering exchanges between artists working in France and writers from elsewhere, resulting in the production of in-depth critical essays.
Today, the first 40 texts of the programme, published in English and French, form the foundation of an expanding archive—a mirror of a scene in constant reinvention. By bringing them together in this publication, the Fondation Pernod Ricard and the French Ministry of Culture reaffirm their shared commitment to artistic creation and to the discourse that sustains it. Produced by Mousse Publishing, it is released in May 2026.
Latest TextWork commissions published:
TextWork #40: Rose is Not Rose
Yto Barrada according to Yasmine Seale
“The marriage of science and imagination, the loving recovery of vernacular knowledge, the project to derive ornament and sustenance from local life-forms echo Barrada’s longstanding interest in natural colours, resulting in the creation of a dye garden in her hometown of Tangier, another port city on the northern tip of Africa. Throwaways—things intended to be discarded after brief use—are her mode, her meat. An art of salvage is also one of resistance and survival: doing the most with the least.”
Yasmine Seale is a writer and artist whose work includes poetry, criticism, translation and printmaking.
TextWork #41: This very humid land that I love so much
Christian Bertin according to Skye Arundhati Thomas
“Bertin’s world, a metal-infused land of his wonder, and of his salvage: everywhere there are sculptures, assemblies, collages; of washing machine tumblers and doors, car fenders, tin roofs, new or with layers of red-golden rust, glass bottles flickering in curving patterns, ornamented pieces of wood. Barrel bottoms flattened and joined with nails—the metal made to look so thin, nearing translucency. Bertin uses scrap with the same fluidity as an illustrator with ink in their pen. Reclaimed metal, glass, and wood—so seemingly inflexible, worn down, already consumed, considered delinquent, unusable—take on new form under Bertin’s care. Scattered around the property are Bertin’s ovens, in which he sometimes bakes his sculptures—serrated tin sheets hitched perpendicular to the sky, panelled in glass, with light pouring in.”
Read more on TextWork.
Skye Arundhati Thomas is a writer, editor and curator from India whose work pays special attention to contemporary politics, culture and the multiple histories of South Asia.
Upcoming TextWork publications
Laëtitia Badaut Haussmann according to Laura McLean-Ferris
Valentin Noujaïm according to Yina Jiménez Suriel
Gisèle Vienne according to Judith Butler
TextWork fosters and supports the work of artists active in the French art scene through the publication of long-form critical essays produced by international writers. With this programme, the Pernod Ricard Foundation reinforces its commitment of over 25 years to supporting and disseminating this art scene. TextWork is conceived with the support of the French Ministry of Culture.
