The Berlin-based artist duo Elmgreen & Dragset are the subject of a major solo exhibition, Bonne Chance, at Centre Pompidou-Metz, Metz, France. Marking their first solo exhibition in a French institution, Bonne Chance introduces a selection of the duo’s installations that replicate common urban settings and scenarios across the museum’s Grand Nef, Forum, and rooftop gallery.

Collaborating since 1995, Elmgreen & Dragset are known for their work that reimagines traditional exhibition spaces, transforming them into settings that resemble other institutional environments. Through their witty and critical interpretations of social and everyday stereotypes, these transformations allude to the underlying systems within everyday spaces and invite visitors to reevaluate aspects of contemporary society from new perspectives.

Within the exhibition, the duo redefines the exhibition format by conceiving temporary architectures and life-sized models of public and private spatial settings, reminiscent of those seen in everyday life. Notably, The One & the Many recreates an apartment structure commonly seen in Berlin. Other familiar settings, such as a theater auditorium, public restroom, laboratory, conference room, morgue, CCTV surveillance room, and desolate office landscape, are presented within labyrinthine structures throughout the museum.

The life-like silicone figures engaging in various activities intensify the discomfort and artificiality evoked by the duo's urban environment. As visitors meander through and encounter these nameless figures, they are invited to engage more actively with the exhibition, piecing together different clues and making conjectures about what might have happened or what is about to unfold at each spot. However, the various structures and staged scenarios that viewers navigate, akin to playing a game, follow an incoherent logic where normal rules no longer apply. Through this deliberate paradox, Elmgreen & Dragset highlight the absurd systems of contemporary society where defeat and exclusion prevail. 

Adding a touch of irony through its title, Bonne Chance renders the large-scale structures utterly powerless, demonstrating that one’s win is not a result of chance but potentially of choice. The exhibition remains on view until April 1, 2024.