Benjamin Seror: Fascination

Curated by Elfi Turpin.

Fascination is an exhibition of sad songs, a happy and gleaming exhibition through which Benjamin Seror shares his reflections on art’s ability to provide access to our feelings.

With Fascination, music and song are mobilized as active tools that enable us to inhabit spaces of intimacy, to be moved—tools that encourage us to take action in our daily lives. What is it about music that affects us so much? How can it bring such intense emotional experiences? We are all experts on songs that constitute a kind of internal repertoire of emotions and experiences. To bring songs to the street, the train, or the waiting room, is to bring a space along with us, to bring a whole cultural horizon, an emotional survival kit. What will happen when we listen to Those with the Fake Shoes?

"I’m sad to say 
That you’ll have to learn 
To run a battle and to lose and to run away

When it’s time
To pick a technique
I wish you’d choose one that includes a retreat

It took only 15 years to see the worst coming back 
I would have never guessed I would say these words
Nothing is ever stable, nothing will stay the same 
Nothing stays very safe, oh no no no no

In deep dark corners with their deep dark mind
You’ll see them waiting to get fed from your rage

I wish I could celebrate, I would love to sing your victories
But how to also celebrate those who avoid the fight

Please learn to run away, learn to find a friend
Please learn to recognize those who walk with fake shoes
They go with fake pants and they wear their fake shirts
They try to look the same but their costume is wearing off

Their costume is wearing off, their costume is wearing off
Let’s not let them have this dance, let’s dance somewhere else

Dance and cry but not with them
Dance and cry but not with them
Let’s not let them have this dance
Let's dance somewhere else
Dance and cry but not with them
Dance and cry but not with them"

The exhibition Fascination attempts to transmit experiences, stories and knowledges through thrill: the goosebumps on our skin with the passing of an emotion. An embodied transmission carried by eight songs that were written and recorded by Benjamin Seror in recent months—eight songs, sad like our worlds, accompanied by flowers, colors, a few words by Tarek Lakhrissi, and a dialogue with the work of Binta Diaw, Ru Kim, Yan Li and Sohyun Park.

—Elfi Turpin, November 2021.

The opening will take place on Sunday, November 14, from 12 to 6pm. On this occasion, a free shuttle will leave from Basel. Departure at 1:30pm from SBB Süd Station—Meret Oppenheim Strasse. Return to Basel at 3:30pm. For reservations, please contact Richard Neyroud: r.neyroud@cracalsace.com

Benjamin Seror receives the support of CNAP, Centre national des arts plastiques. A program of interviews and podcasts by the artist, which will be broadcast during this exhibition, is supported by Ministère de la Culture—Direction générale de la création artistique, DRAC Grand Est.

CRAC Alsace is supported by Ville d’Altkirch, Collectivité européenne d’Alsace, Région Grand Est and DRAC Grand Est—Ministère de la Culture.