b. 1959, Antwerp, Belgium. Lives and works in Mexico City, Mexico.

Francis Alÿs is known for his many projects that start with walking as a way of experiencing, and ultimately activating, a space. In The Modern Procession (2002), hundreds of revelers crossed New York’s Queensboro Bridge, bearing reproductions of artworks from the Museum of Modern Art collection on hand-held carriages, in the manner of a traditional religious procession. The act, which coincided with MoMA’s temporary relocation to Queens, was a participatory event that probed the iconic status of art objects and the museum as a destination for pilgrimage.

As is typical of Alÿs’s practice, documents archiving the work’s production coalesced in the final display. The installation is comprised of film footage, drawings, and ephemera, including erroneous press clips and a string of emails between Alÿs and MoMA personnel in which the project is variously debated, adapted, canceled, and resurrected over the course of three years. The piece probes the role of the sponsoring institution and access to the public sphere. Its full process folds into its final form, a phenomenon characterized by one participant (then-Public Art Fund Director Tom Eccles) as “a chaotic event that grew to have its own pace over the course of the procession.”

Image Credit:
Francis Alÿs
The Modern Procession, 2002.
Image courtesy of David Zwirner Gallery.