LAB 36 presents Gino Rubert’s latest and most ambitious work “Open House”, a site specific piece commissioned by a good friend and art collector.
The complicity and confidence between artist and patron – “you have complete freedom” Vicenç told him – and the large format of the commissioned work – two meters wide by almost nine meters long – has hinted at Rubert’s work process, reformulating and making his language more sophisticated in order to display a gallery of people and situations that do not have former precedents.
Open House is a family portrait in which references, allusions, quotes, and winks to the patron are conjoined with the characters and distinguished environments that the artist portrays. The personal emblem of the commissioner – a V resting over the valley of an M – designed by Gino for the occasion, is carved in iron on the door and etched into the wood of a chair. Some of their family members appear with a sweetly perverse irony: the mother-in-law, converted into a little girl/old woman who drags her daughter-doll; the father, transformed in a little boy/old man with three eyes; or the wife and son, reincarnated into Andalusian puppets. And, of course, Vicens is portrayed as a party guest who offers a “mermaid cauldron” posing in a gesture that reminds us of the figures of patrons that appear in the medieval polyptychs.
Opening times:
Friday, February 17: 16-20h
Saturday, February 18: 16-20h
Tuesday, February 21: 16-20h
Galeria Senda will participate on the 11th edition of Contemporary Istanbul with a selection of works by artists such as Peter Halley, AES+F, Francis Lisa Ruyter, Ola Kolehmainen, among others. Join us at Booth A1-115!
The Phosphorescence exhibition shows a series of paintings that focus on the isolation of the individual in our society. The series reflects situations of absolute intimacy where the subject is totally isolated from all surroundings and is immersed in the light emitted by certain electronic devices.
Light takes on a spiritual connotation. If someone unaware of the meaning of the screen itself were to observe the scenes that make up Phosphorescence, they would think something magical or mystical was happening.
Silence, stillness, calm. The invasion of the intimate space.
The characters appear from the shadows and are immersed in this light that traps them. The subtlety of the darkness makes their faces appear blurred, and lose their identity, in a metaphor for depersonalisation.
“A phosphorescent jewel gives off its glow and colour in the dark and loses its beauty in the light of day. Were it not for shadows, there would be no beauty.” (Jun’ichirō Tanizaki, In Praise of Shadows)
Place: LAB 36, Calle Trafalgar 36, Barcelona.
Visiting hours: Tuesday – Friday 4pm to 8pm
When speaking about method, the repetition is mentioned, but rarely the insistence. To insist is synonymous of to research, and at the same time implies the development of an almost unbearable continuity sustained by the nerve, by a reliance which knows it will find a reward, not only in the effect, but also in the construction of a character. This exhibition explores -from the work of an artist devoted to painting-, the possibility of a different contemporary world, open to an esthetic that does not allow any kind of assimilation to our present and, thus, it opens itself in a radical way to futurity.
Boum! Boum! En avant la musique! is a 29 minute fiction movie filmed in Paris in 1974 in 16 mm colour (Kodakhrome II), interpreted by Jaume Xifra and Pierre Restany, and edited on DVD in 2007.
The pathetic figure of a Marshal wanders a mound of boots of dead soldiers, as a parody of the military leaders that always survive at the rear bases, draws a kind of rancid and triumphalist path. “The film inspires a metaphor that engages you into a soft delirium. It is a playful critique, resounding and burlesque, a savage attack against the inconsistency of the war, and a chant to the revealing and committed creativity”. (Pierre Restany)
It is a musical film with a wide repertoire of songs from the soldierly that includes speeches and original photographic documents from World War I.
Besides, if we go through the cast of actors, together with Xifra, Restany, Miralda himself –who interprets the soldier-, we can find names like Denis Rivière, Jean-Pierre Béranger, Liliane François or Roy Adzak. All of them evoque the Parisian artistic atmosphere that Miralda and Rossell frequented at the beginning of the 70’s
Place: Hotel YURBBAN, calle trafalgar 30, Barcelona.
Time: 10h a 19h
It is an imaginary journey inspired in the industry of mass tourism, entertainment, the elderly and the concept of a journey with no return. Filmed in super 8 in 1980 in a cruise as part of the unrealised project “By boat, by train and by plane”, the video, recently edited, presents itself as a story of five episodes: Goodbye, Initiation Ritual, Sweets&Enjoyment, Enigma and Uploading.
The video starts with the farewell of the passengers on board, afterwards they join us for a tour on the boat through a processional ritual through the halls, a cake banquet and a dance in the ballroom. To these cheerful and crowded scenes, follow others more silent with the hallways full of luggage that will afterwards be landed by the crew.
Galeria Senda is pleased to participate in Art Brussels 2016 that will take place for the first in Tour & Taxis. Artists presented include Adrián Balseca, Federico Martínez, Peter Halley, Gao Xingjian, James Clar, Glenda León, Oleg Dou and Sandra Vásquez de la Horra
This year, we have focused in works that build relationships between individuals through different cultures, religions and spirituality. To this effect, we will also present a selection of key works that are in direct dialogue with contemporary aesthetic. The artists of this year’s edition are Vasco Aráujo, Jordi Bernadó, Martín Chirino, James Clar, Peter Halley, Yago Hortal, Ola Kolehmainen, Glenda León, Anna Malagrida, Mathieu Pernot, Isabel Rocamora y Gino Rubert.
Ola Kolehmainen (Helsinki, 1964) plunged himself into the Turkish architecture constructed between the 500 to the 1600 in his Istanbul works. The initiative came as a Commission given by the Borusan Collection in Istanbul. The project was emphasized in Mosques designed by the Ottoman architect Mimar Sinan. Kolehmainen added to the plan the tradition of Sinan, the Byzantine architecture.
In addition to this commission, the Goethe Institute Istanbul invited him to half-year artist residence program. These two invites, a pure coincidence time-wise, provided him a full concentration to the work which was to change his professional life.
The result of this series celebrates volume, light and color of these sacred buildings and integrates profane items such as scaffolding and lighting appliances into the compositions. This approach to the antique, adds a whole new paradigm of investigation to the artists’ work where he has captured the sublime essence of this historic constructions and their mysticism.
During the half-year period besides his almost daily work in the Mosques from the 16th century designed by Sinan, furthermore Kolehmainen was given the opportunity to work alone inside the Hagia Sophia (5th century).
In this year’s edition of ArtInternational Istanbul that will take place from September 4th to 6th, we will be able to show in premiere some of the artworks in this series and an artist portfolio created exclusively for the occasion.
Istanbul Works is a Limited Edition artist portfolio made by Finnish photographer Ola Kolehmainen. Each box contains 12+1 artworks printed in archival quality paper (and a single image different from the rest).
The portfolio box is a Fine Arts edition and high quality archive with easy to handle removable folders conveniently designed for protection (gloves are not required).
Edition 21 + 5 AP.
420 x 597 mm (each of the artworks)
Box: 425 x 600 x 55 mm
Matadero Madrid presents Cada Respiro (Every Breath), a large audiovisual video installation created by Cuban artist Glenda León, who is recognised as one of the most influential creators of her generation. Curated by Christian Dominguez, Cada Respiro seeks not only to convey the link that exists between people and the world they inhabit, but also the potential within human beings to transform the world. The five screens that make up Cada Respiro depict images as distinct and monumental as land, the sky, fire and the sea, moving in a simulation of the motion of breathing, an act repeated time and again which, in confluence with the heartbeat, indicates life. It is the bridge between the world and the body, as each time we inhale we take something of the world into us, and every exhalation returns something of us to the world. The artist uses this motion to convey not only the link that exists between people and the world they inhabit, but also the potential within human beings to make a change. She provides a dash of optimism by showing that such transformation is not as distant a possibility as it sometimes seems.
