Jean-Philippe Delhomme. Flowers with chessboard, 2025 Oil on canvas. Photo: Tanguy Beurdeley. Courtesy of the artist and Perrotin
Many artists have been decent chess players, some have been obsessed with the game. Think of Marcel Duchamp and the famous photo of him playing chess with a naked young woman (writer and Los Angeles It girl Eve Babitz, by the way) across the chessboard. Think of Man Ray, who labeled himself a “third rate player”, who, in 1926, designed new forms for chess pieces. Just like Salvador Dali, also a chess player and the designer of a set.
Chess has held a central place in the life of many artists. Sometimes, it was just a pretext. John Cage, realizing that Marcel Duchamp was at the end of his life, asked the artist to teach him the game. For the last 3 years of Marcel Duchamp’s life, the 2 of them played chess. Once, exasperated by John Cage’s mediocre talent at the game, Duchamp asked: “Don’t you ever play to win?” Author Sylvère Lotringer recounts: “Cage was a Zen Buddhist to the core: why should anyone have to win ? He had already won what he wanted: spending time with Duchamp!”
Man Ray, Permanent Attraction 1948/1971, 1948 - 1971
Yayoi Kusama, Barbara Kruger, Damien Hirst, Paul McCarthy, among many other artists, were either chess players or designed chess pieces. Honoré Daumier, Paul Klee, Henri Matisse, Thomas Eakins featured chess in some of their best known works, as well many painters from the 15th and 16th Century, like Lucas van Leyden’s The Game of Chess (1508) or Niccolo di Pietro in his Conversion of Saint Augustin (1413-15). Chess was invented in India in the 6th Century and it reached Europe around the 10th Century.
Inspired by this very rich and long tradition, Perrotin Paris decided to explore the influence of chess in contemporary art. The exhibition features 25 artists as different as Jean Cocteau, Martin Parr, Daniel Spoerri, William Wegman, Alice Guittard, Jean Philippe Delhomme, Michel Journiac, Lee Bae or Lynn Chadwick and many others.
The exhibition features works about chess through different mediums - sculpture, painting, photography - and different generations. “The selection spans a century, offering a glimpse of modern art history through the lens of chess,” explains Jonathan Lambert, the originator of the exhibition idea.
In case all these works triggered an irrepressible desire to play chess on the spot, Perrotin has installed 4 chess tables and is organizing a tournament.
– Jean-Sébastien Stehli
Gregor Hildebrandt auf einem Pferd, 2025 Audio cassette tape on canvas Photo: Roman März. Courtesy of the artist and Perrotin
Un Siècle d’Echecs / A Hundred Years of Chess. Perrotin Paris. Until Feb. 28. perrotin.com
View of the group show 'Un siècle d'échecs' at Perrotin Paris, 2026. Photo: Claire Dorn. Courtesy of all the artists and Perrotin. ©ADAGP, Paris, 2026.
