Robert Filliou — Maintenant, 1984

A red line and a sequence of arrows lead towards a star whose upper point disappears beyond the edge of the page. Beneath it, Robert Filliou has written a single word: Maintenant! (“Now!”). The image remains deliberately unfinished, as though still in the process of becoming. A rubber stamp declares the sheet a Multiple à exemplaire unique (“Multiple in a Unique Example”). Although the work was printed in an edition, Filliou insists that every copy remains unique in the moment it is experienced. This is one expression of what he called a “poetical economy”: a way of valuing creativity over perfection and recognising the unfinished as an opportunity for continual invention. Every maintenant marks another beginning.

At the core of Robert Filliou’s practice are ideas of language, play and exchange. Trained in economics and associated with Fluxus, he conceived art as a continuous, collective activity embedded in everyday life. His work challenges conventional notions of authorship, value and production, favouring openness, humour and participation. Through gestures that blur the boundaries between art and non-art, Filliou redefined creation as an ongoing process of thinking, making and sharing, an approach that continues to shape the understanding of art as a space of exchange.