Dialogues at Ordovas
Dialogues
October 9, 2025 — December 12, 2025
From 9 October to 12 December 2025, Ordovas presents Dialogues, an exhibition exploring the influence of non-Western art on twentieth and twenty first-century movements, and how opinions relating to the topic have been tested, revised and expanded over the years.
Juxtaposing major works of Western art with those from Africa and Oceania, the exhibition looks back to the early 20th century when artists including Ernst and Picasso first encountered masks and sculptures from these areas, approaching them with a renewed perspective, and inspiring them to pioneer a new art movement. The exhibition also includes a selection of contemporary works reflecting the conversations this subject has continued to promote over recent years, and its enduring relevance today.
In presenting this exhibition, Ordovas is pleased to be working in collaboration with Jean Fritts, an independent advisor and former International Chairman African & Oceanic Art at Sotheby’s, and her former colleague, Pierre Mollfulleda who was head of the department in Paris. A fully illustrated catalogue includes specially commissioned essays by Philippe Peltier, former department head at the Musée du quai Branly-Jacques Chirac in Paris, who contributed to the 1984 catalogue for the landmark exhibition “Primitivism” in 20th Century Art: Affinities of the Tribal and the Modern at MoMA.
Dialogues: European, American, African, and Oceanic Art from the 20th and 21st Centuries
Featuring Affinities, Fractures, Resonances: A Century of Dialogues between the West and Non-Western Arts by Philippe Peltier
