70-year-old artist Claude Lévêque, who previously represented France at the 2009 Venice Biennale, has been charged by a French court with the rape and sexual assault of multiple teenagers under the age of 15. The artist is now forbidden from leaving France and is subject to a ban on entering into any relationship with ten of his alleged victims.
Previous allegations against Lévêque by the sculptor and art teacher Laurent Fallon were made public in 2021. Fallon stated that Lévêque sexually assaulted and raped him while he was still teenager during the 1980s between the ages of 10 and 17. Two brothers subsequently testified that they had been abused by Lévêque in the late 1990s when they were between 13 and 17. Lévêque denied the claims, which were not covered by the statute of limitations.
Lévêque had previously exhibited his work at the Louvre Museum in 2014, when he lit up the I. M. Pei-designed pyramid with a strip of red neon (pictured). He was represented by Kamel Menour gallery, who have since suspended the artist from their roster. A permanent installation by the artist has been removed from the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Geneva, while his public light installation in Montreuil has been switched off.
