Still from Don’t Cross the Bridge Before You Get to the River (2008), a film by Francis Alÿs. Photo Roberto Rubalcava
This year, Francis Alÿs becomes the seventh artist to receive the Whitechapel Gallery’s prestigious annual Art Icon award in partnership with Swarovski. Previously won by the likes of Rachel Whiteread (2019) and Mona Hatoum (2018), the award celebrates what Whitechapel Gallery director Iwona Blazwick calls “The lyrical vision of Alÿs’s actions, films and paintings which transcends social and national boundaries to reveal a common humanity”. Though the Belgian-born artist works with everything from painting and sculpture to video and installation, Alÿs’s preferred choice of artistic medium is often the human body – his own or that of a collective.
Still from Children’s Game 12 (2012), a film by Francis Alÿs.
This article was originally published in the Spring 2020 Issue
