T magazine: In Paris, a Mesmerizing Multimedia Installation by the Artist Helen Marten

For over a decade, the fashion brand Miu Miu has supported the work of female artists by hosting exhibitions, underwriting projects and organizing film festivals. At this year’s Art Basel Paris, the brand is exhibiting an ambitious new project conceived by the British multimedia artist Helen Marten. Titled “30 Blizzards,” it incorporates installation, text, music, video, a libretto and, in a first for Marten, a two-hour performance piece conceived in collaboration with the composer Beatrice Dillon and the theater and opera director Fabio Cherstich. “Writing is a fundamental part of my practice, but I’ve never written explicitly for voices or song before,” says Marten. “So to be asked to make a performance was intriguing and quite daunting.” The project is structured around five podiums scattered across the Palais d’Iéna (the usual venue for Miu Miu’s runway shows). Each one references a stage in life, from childhood to adulthood and older age, and pairs a sculptural tableau with a video and monologue voiced by one of several artists, including the actress Kathryn Hunter and Marten’s younger sister, Laura Green. Marten hopes it will feel immersive, with the all-encompassing effect of a blizzard: “Snow arrives,” she says, “and it either destructs, it distorts, or it completely covers the ground so it becomes a space upon which to write anew.”