From 15 December 2024 to 20 April 2025, Fondation Opale (Lens/Crans-Montana) presents its new exhibition, NOTHING IS TOO BEAUTIFUL FOR THE GODS, a carte blanche project curated by French curator Jean-Hubert Martin.
An immersion into the richness and extraordinary diversity of the visual expressions of human spirituality, Nothing Is Too Beautiful for the Gods unfolds in three chapters through some sixty works. It begins with a selection of altars from cultures around the world—objects that exist at the intersection of sacred architecture and ceremonial furniture, originally activated through ritual practices and here reconstructed within a museum context. The exhibition then turns to artists, often marginalized, born during the first half of the twentieth century, whose work is directly informed by their religious beliefs and who openly claimed this dual identity as both practitioners of faith and participants in modern—and sometimes avant-garde—art. Finally, the exhibition presents a new generation of artists who approach questions of colonization with confidence, advocating for the recognition of their cultural heritage—particularly Indigenous cultures—and highlighting religious traditions, whether dogmatic, shamanic, or animist.
Art has always been a powerful means of expressing faith, gratitude, and the search for transcendence. Through sculpture, painting, altars, song, dance, and ritual, believers from diverse cultures have sought to honour their gods and spirits and connect with a higher spiritual dimension. For those who do not adhere to a particular religion, artistic creation itself can become a search for meaning and a path toward communion with a higher presence, inspired by nature, philosophy, meditation, or other mystical traditions. This exhibition reveals how such practices, far from being relics of the past, continue to nourish contemporary artistic creation.
Nothing Is Too Beautiful for the Gods explores the diversity of spiritual and artistic practices by bringing together altars and contemporary artworks that embody this universal quest for transcendence. Artistic creations rooted in ancestral African, Caribbean, Oceanic, and Asian traditions are presented alongside works by contemporary artists such as Kimsooja, El Anatsui, Sandra Vásquez de la Horra, and Christian Boltanski, who reinterpret these forms of devotion through a contemporary lens.
At a time when the boundaries between artistic disciplines and cultures are becoming increasingly fluid, the exhibition reflects on the place of the sacred—and of sacred beings—in contemporary society. The works on view, including a site-specific installation created by artists from the Napperby Aboriginal community in the Northern Australian desert, demonstrate that these traditions are not frozen in the past but remain living, evolving practices that continue to influence and inspire artists today.
Nothing Is Too Beautiful for the Gods invites visitors to reflect on the relationship between art, spirituality, and culture. By expanding the scope of what we define as "art," the exhibition encourages audiences to question how Western institutions have historically shaped and limited this concept. It seeks to shed light on the visual expressions of Indigenous cultures—often overlooked within the discourse of contemporary art—and to reveal their enduring relevance today.
