ART CITIES: Bilbao-Art And Space

In the ‘50s and ‘60s, the German philosopher Martin Heidegger turned to sculpture to examine the relationship between bodies and space, and generally the role of art in our lives. In collaboration with the Basque artist Eduardo Chillada, he published a seminal artist’s book titled “Art and Space” in 1969.

By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Guggenheim Bilbao Archive

This collaboration between Chillada and Heidegger is the point of departure for the exhibition “Art and Space” at Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. Titled after the above-mentioned book, it attempts to expand on key concepts that resulted from this creative partnership, such as place, the presence of things, the relationship between art and science, etc. The exhibition presents 100 works by international artists in order to offer a fresh reading of abstraction over the course of the last 60 years. In addition to a selection of Chillida’s works, the first Gallery “From Recognizing to Questioning Space” contains works by great pioneers like: Lucio Fontana, Jorge Oteiza, and Naum Gabo and other artists whose work followed in the wake of their investigations, including Agostino Bonalumi, Sue Fuller, and Norbert Kricke. It also features several artists whose creations illustrate the renewal of the language of abstraction in the mid to late ‘60s, most notably Eva Hesse, represented here by a dozen Studio Works , and Brazilian artist Anna Maria Maiolino, whose activity continues to this day. The generation of conceptual and site-specific pioneers is likewise present in this gallery with works by Gordon Matta-Clark and Lawrence Weiner. “The Ambiguity of the Void” From the mid- ‘70s to the dawn of the digital age in the ‘90s, creative projects that challenged the legitimacy of abstraction proliferated on every continent. Some of the artists active in this period returned to the plastic tradition of abstraction in any of its forms: Constructivism, Neo-Concrete, Minimalism, etc.but did not allow their practice to be associated with any particular trend or movement. In the works of Waltercio Caldas, Mary Corse, Robert Gober, and Prudencio Irazabal, artistic matter produces encounters that border on mirage, while Vija Celmins’s work explores the surfaces of the sky and sea in an attempt to nullify perspective and scale. Meanwhile, the tension between model and fragment, between the found and the built, appears here in works by Isa Genzken and Zarina. In Susana Solano’s case, the idea of a hollow hill connects notions of interior (such as a ceiling vault or a basement) and exterior (a valley or an upside-down mountain). The works exhibited in the gallery “Mutations” evince constant fluctuation on the material plane and radical speculation on the conceptual plane. The constant mutations of the canvas in Ángela de la Cruz’s work contrast with the indiscriminate use of all sorts of materials by Jean-Luc Moulène, whose sculptures orchestrate a collision of notions drawn from topology, politics, and cultural history. Agnieszka Kurant uses the surprising levitation of her meteorites to suggest the convergence of the artistic value of air (beginning with the iconic Paris Air bottled by Marcel Duchamp in 1919) and its property value in the current economy. In 1969, Robert Smithson coined the term “mirror travel” in connection with the ephemeral compositions he had made on a trek through the Mexican state of Yucatan. The ideas of travel and reflection also converge in the gallery “Motionless Journeys”, in two opposing pieces by Olafur Eliasson. One of them, suspended from the ceiling, serves as a compass, magnetically aligning itself with the gallery’s north-south axis; the other, comprising 24 solid glass spheres, multiplies the image of its surroundings and, like a lunar cycle, gradually compresses it. In the gallery “Inexhaustible Places” are three impossible places. In her sculptures, Cristina Iglesias presents an idea of hospitality and intimate shelter. Richard Long’s “Bilbao Circle”, made of slate fragments, makes us imagine a ritual setting. For Lee Ufan, the canvas is the place where the vibrations of mind and body are united in the form of lines and strokes. “From Frame to Wall: Closed Space” In the 1970s, Bruce Nauman created a series of installations in which the perception of the spectator’s own body was drastically altered by an anomalous, uncomfortable space, as in “Green Light Corridor”. He also made videos by giving instructions to actors and playing with similar sensations. During the same decade, Robert Motherwell began to mark vast color fields with small squares, alluding to the picture’s former function as a window on the world. Later, Peter Halley made the cell his leitmotiv to highlight the distressing obsession of both artistic and architectural modernity with geometry. On presentation are works by: Agustino Bonalumi, Nina Canell, Anthony Caro, Vija Celmins, Eduardo Chillida, Ángela de la Cruz, Olafur Eliasson, Lucio Fontana, Sue Fuller, Naum Gabo, Marcius Galan, General Idea, Maria Elena González, Isa Genzken, Robert Gober, Peter Halley, Cristina Iglesias, Norbert Kricke, Agnieszka Kurant, Gordon Matta-Clark, Julie Mehretu, Anna Maria Maiolino, Asier Mendizabal, Jean-Luc Moulène, Matt Mullican, Iván Navarro, Ernesto Neto, Rivane Neuenschwander, Damián Ortega, Alyson Shotz, Jorge Oteiza, Sergio Prego, Susana Solano, Lee Ufan, Lawrence Weiner and Zarina.

Info: Curator: Manuel Cirauqui, Guggenheim Bilbao, Abandoibarra et.2, Bilbao, Duration: 5/12/17-15/4/18, Days & Hours: Tue-Sun 10:00-20:00, www.guggenheim-bilbao.eus