Rocket Science

Robert Cumming

Steven Pippin

Roman Signer

Rocket Science brings together photographs, sculptures and a large-scale painting by three artists who, from the 1970s to the present day, have repeatedly put their ingenuity to work on more or less vertiginous technical ventures. Often involving explosions, large or small, real or illusory, these works, which elevate the absurd, leave room for laughter. After all, it’s not rocket science.

Robert Cumming was born in Massachusetts in 1943 and died in California in 2021. Steven Pippin was born in the UK in 1960 and lives in London. Roman Signer was born in 1938 in Appenzell, Switzerland, and now lives in St. Gallen.

As curator of the contemporary collections at the Musée national d’art moderne – Centre Pompidou, Frédéric Paul curated the exhibition Robert Cumming, l’œuvre photographique, 1969–1980 at Frac Limousin in 1994. He has exhibited Steven Pippin’s work on three occasions: Study in Time and Motion at Frac Limousin in 1995, Steven Pippin at the Domaine de Kerguéhennec in 2007, and Aberration optique at the Centre Pompidou in 2017.

Rocket Science is organised as part of the Bicentenary of Photography.