Interrupción de la memoria I

El próximo 3 de abril se inaugura la exposición Instancias de la memoria, del artista Carlos Antonio Otero, en el Museo de Arte Francisco Oller en Bayamón, en Puerto Rico.
Múltiples disciplinas saltan a la vista en el presente trabajo de Otero, donde convergen la pintura, el dibujo y la instalación en un diálogo abstracto y conceptual, sin dejar de lado elementos figurativos. Se trata de una muestra ecléctica que indaga en los enigmas de la memoria y estimula la reflexión acerca de las cosas que recordamos, y sobre todo las que olvidamos.
Las esferas, a modo de neuronas desconectadas unas de otras, flotando o cayendo, se presentan como elemento unificador en todas las piezas. Estas arrastran vivencias, recuerdos, historia.
Se trata de la memoria interrumpida, personal o colectiva, por un evento traumático, porque otros quieren que olvidemos, por una enfermedad o simplemente porque olvidamos.
El artista emplea diversos medios para concretar sus piezas. Estos van desde los más antiguos como el gouache y el carboncillo, otros más modernos como la pintura acrílica y el esmalte, y medios no tradicionales que incluyen la masilla de concreto, poliuretano y diversos materiales de construcción.
La apertura será el 3 de abril a las 7:00 de la noche, y la muestra estará abierta al público de lunes a viernes en horario diurno, hasta el 29 de abril.

Rosa B

The web magazine, Rosa B, is a new space for reflection and discourse on the cultural practices of today.
http://www.rosab.net

The web magazine, Rosa B, is a new space for reflection and discourse on the cultural practices of today. By choosing the medium of digital creation and the Internet rather than paper as the means of circulation, Rosa B believes that an innovative writing criticism, with temporal spaces and devices is better suited and the only possible text to reflect art today. Rosa B encourages approaches that are liberated, more inventive, less formatted.

The first issue of Rosa B is devoted to publishing. Thomas Boutoux, writer, curator and co-director of the gallery castillo/corrales in Paris, was responsible for its conception. Featured is a filmed visit at Mark Manders’studio, a Dutch artist who is also the co-manager, along with designer Roger Willems, of the publishing house Roma Publications; an interview with the novelist, publisher and activist American Matthew Stadler; a filmed interview with Stuart Bailey, editor of the magazine Dot Dot Dot and one of the two persons behind Dexter Sinister (New York); the presentation and first translation into French of an historical text by the German philosopher Friedrich Kittler, regarding the importance of technology in the history of modern thought; and the first elements of a new archive, based on a questionnaire sent to a number of artists, delving into their relationship with the
printed material.

Rosa B is the project of the CAPC Museum of Contemporary Art and the School of Fine Arts in Bordeaux, France. The questions discussed in this first issue are at the heart of the thinking behind an art school and a museum: whether it be the issues of reproduction, layout spaces and situations, the limits of the white cube or the context of the workshop; whether it be the practices in publishing and graphics, the transformation of modes of transmission of knowledge, or the notion of artistic heritage.

Rosa B is a tri-annual magazine, whose name was inspired by the Bordelaise artist Rosa Bonheur, known for her academic and animal paintings, for her adventurous life and being a queer muse.

Hirshhorn Museum and
Sculpture Garden

Amy Sillman’s B, 2007,
courtesy of the artist and Sikkema Jenkins & Co., New York.

Directions: Amy Sillman,
Third Person Singular
March 13, 2008 - July 6, 2008

http://www.hirshhorn.si.edu/

Brooklyn-based painter Amy Sillman introduces an entirely new body of work as part of the Hirshhorn’s ongoing “Directions” series. Inspired by first-person observation of the human figure and the emotional aspects of being part of a couple, these new paintings and drawings explore the tension between figuration and abstraction. “Amy Sillman, Third Person Singular,” on view from March 13 through July 6, presents 13 oil paintings and 12 ink drawings.

Since August 2006, Sillman has been drawing couples from life. Sessions with 17 different couples, many of them close friends, resulted in simple black-ink drawings that have become the starting point for the works presented in “Third Person Singular.” After the life-drawing sessions, Sillman makes additional drawings of the couples from memory—12 of which have been selected for the show. Simultaneously, the life and memory drawings serve as inspiration for the related paintings on view.

During the process of creating these new works, both the drawings and paintings become gradually more abstract as the details of the figures are shrouded behind bold strokes and geometric forms. Notably sculptural, the finished paintings are the result of numerous layers and a continuous reworking, erasing and covering over of sections. Sillman embraces abstraction without abandoning representation, resisting any prescribed categories in painting. This creates a sense of tension between areas of levity and weight and between barely visible outlines of body parts and planes of color, sometimes suggestive of domestic architecture.

Sillman is known for paintings that are intimate, psychological and full of humor and pathos. The new paintings included in “Third Person Singular” use shapes to explore what Sillman calls “pessimistic optimism” or a sense of anxiety within what seems to be an otherwise cheerful image. Beginning with first-person observation, these new paintings ultimately present feelings and anxieties in a formal, abstract language. Sillman deliberately places herself as the third person in a triangle, allowing for a distanced, analytic view while acknowledging her profound connection to her subjects. Sillman maps the space between the first and third persons in order to provoke and seduce the second person:
the viewer.

This year, the “Directions” series marks its 20th year at the Hirshhorn. Conceived as a way to address the vitality, diversity and inventiveness that characterizes contemporary art, the series brings new work of emerging and established artists to Washington, D.C. “Amy Sillman, Third Person Singular” was co-organized by the Hirshhorn and the Frances Young Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. The exhibition will be on view at the Tang Museum from July 19 to Jan. 4, 2009.

The presentation at the Hirshhorn is made possible through the generous support of the Trellis Fund, the Holenia Trust Fund II, the Hirshhorn’s board of trustees and contributions to the Annual Circle. This exhibition is organized by Hirshhorn curator Anne Ellegood and Ian Berry, associate director for curatorial affairs and Malloy curator for the Tang Teaching Museum. The accompanying catalog features an essay by Ellegood and an interview between Sillman and Berry.

Related Programs
An “In Conversation” public program will take place between the artist and exhibition curators March 14 at 12:30 p.m. in the Hirshhorn’s Ring Auditorium. In addition, a podcast of Sillman discussing her work will be available online at http://www.hirshhorn.si.edu .

About the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the Smithsonian’s museum of international modern and contemporary art, has some 11,500 paintings, sculptures, mixed media installations and works on paper in its collection. The Hirshhorn maintains an active and diverse exhibition program and offers an array of free public programs that explore the art of our time. The museum, located at Independence Avenue and Seventh Street S.W. is open daily from 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. (closed Dec. 25), and admission is free. Visit http://www.hirshhorn.si.edu for more information or to download Hirshhorn podcasts on the collection and exhibitions, as well as talks with artists and curators.

Media only: Gabriel Riera (202) 633-4765; rierag@si.edu
Public only: (202) 633-1000; http://www.hirshhorn.si.edu/

STUK Artcentre

Guillaume Leblon
Four Ladders
14/3 - 25/5/2008

Opening: Thursday, 13 March, 7:30 pm
Performance: Thursday 13 March, 8:30 pm &
Wednesday 16 April, 7:30 pm

STUK Artcentre
Naamsestraat 96
B-3000 Leuven, Belgium
Phone +32(0)16 320 320
info@stuk.be
http://www.stuk.be

Guillaume Leblon (b. 1971, Lille, France) creates site-specific installations, sculptures and films. His simple interventions cause tensions that affect our visual perception. In STUK Leblon creates new works in which he explores opposites such as movement and standstill, gravity and weightlessness.

Parallel to the exhibition Leblon, together with Thomas Boutoux, will create the dialogue Suite, which will be performed on the opening night of the exhibition (13 March) and on 16 April in the theatre of STUK. Three young male characters engage in a conversation in which words and sounds intermingle. The public is invited to learn again how to hear and listen.

Though Leblon’s visual language and his interventions often seem minimal, the artist succeeds in activating spaces and loading them with various meanings. The objects present seem enigmas that comprise heterogeneous references. On the one hand, Leblon departs from the surrounding space, from its qualities and history, which he undermines through small shifts. On the other hand, he introduces primary elements or natural phenomena, such as gravity, air, smoke or water. He thus charges certain materials and situations that at first sight seem rather minimal with metaphorical meanings. Through his interventions, Leblon visualises both the invisible aspect of (natural) phenomena and their destructive aspects or those qualities that escape control. Often he links the outside world with the interior spaces of the exhibition, with natural elements and the everyday appearance of the
artificial context.

The passing of time and the remembrance of things past are always inherently present. The presentations comprise objects that contain traces of history, references to the past or future. Familiar object metamorphose and reappear embodied in new materials or in configurations that allow us to view them from a new perspective. In the installation Four Ladders in STUK, the focus is on the sails of an old windmill. The wooden sail structures turn into a sculptural element in the exhibition room, yet they remain linked to the primordial force of nature they visualise in the outside world, where they are exposed to the elements. It is as if the sails become ladders that cleave the interior space, while other elements are presented independently in the space. The traditional windmill, which is now almost extinct (the ones that remain bearing witness to a past long gone) reminds us of the battle Don Quixote fought. The force of the mill can also be related to labour or the production
of goods. In this installation, Leblon also plays with the paradoxical relation between construction and destruction, between the presentation and revaluation of the sails of the windmill on the occasion of an exhibition and the disappearance of the object as such. As in other works Leblon thus also raises questions about the status of the work of art and the link with reality.

Guillaume Leblon finished his studies in 1997 at the Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts in Lyon. In 1999-2000 he resided at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam. His work has been on view at various solo exhibitions such as the FRAC Bourgogne (Dyon), W139 (Amsterdam) or the Kunstverein in Düsseldorf. His works is represented and regularly shown by his galleries Jocelyn Wolff (Paris) and ProjecteSD (Barcelona). At the moment a solo exhibition by Guillaume Leblon is on view at the Domaine de Kerguéhennec, later this year a show at Culturgest in Porto and the CGAC in Santiago de Compostella will follow. On 17 April Leblon will take part in the project Curating the Library in deSingel, Antwerp.

This exhibition is supported by CULTURESFRANCE.