Conceived by the philosopher and essayist Gilles A. Tiberghien, who signs at CRAC Alsace his first curated project, the exhibition For A Republic Of Dreams gathers more than fifty pieces of art by Silvia Bächli, Glen Baxter, Neal Beggs, Marilyn Bridges, Elina Brotherus, Balthasar Burkhard, Jean Clareboudt, Edith Dekyndt, Marcel Dinahet, Jimmie Durham, Robert Filliou, Thomas Flechtner, Gloria Friedmann, Joan Fontcuberta, Hamish Fulton, Cyprien Gaillard, Mario Giacomelli, Isabelle Krieg, Richard Long, Philippe Mayaux, Nadia Myre, Marylène Negro, Walter Niedermayr, Bernard Plossu, Anne & Patrick Poirier, Eric Poitevin, Hugues Reip, David Renaud, Robin Rhode, Évariste Richer, Ulrich Ruckriem, Hans Schabus, Roman Signer, David Tremlett, Su-Mei Tse, Holger Trülzsch, Catharina Van Eetvelde, Xavier Veilhan, Raphaël Zarka.

Together, they draw the limits of the real world in order to widen it on territories of our imaginary. Issuing from several FRAC collections of the Eastern region of France, the works exhibited, historical or recent, maps, photographs, videos, sculptures, installations, have for a common theme travels, exploration of spaces either remote or very close, displacement, walks, discovery of the landscape.

The Republic of Dreams refers to an eponymous novel by Bruno Schulz published in The Cinnamon Shops. Like the children of the novel, the artists suggest works that are: «characterised by poetry and adventure». And like the hero, «director’s chair of landscapes and cosmic sceneries, their art consists in catching the intentions of nature, in reading through its secret aspirations». The exhibition forms thus a path that lays down the first steps of a republic of dreams and invites visitors to be the first surveyors.

The exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue edited at Les Presses du Réel Publishing. This book summarises all the works and organises them around unpublished extracts from Gilles A. Tiberghien’s travelbooks and texts by poets (Pierre Alferi, Emmanuel Hocquard, Jean-Christophe Bailly, etc). The whole is preceded by a detailed introduction by the author.