DaWire

María Fernanda Plata. Measurement related drawings. Length. 333, 333… m of a single thread on paper, 22 x 29 in, 2007.

María Fernanda Plata‘s (Bogotá, Colombia 1978) Measurement-Related Drawings examines notions of length, weight and area in a visual exploration of architecture that involves measuring and delimitating the material used for each piece. The process can be described as the elaboration of three types of drawings: thread on paper, paper on paper and oil on paper.[...]

Tania Candiani, Protection Helmets, Confronted, 2004

Tania Candiani & Regina José Galindo, Battleground, Live performance and streaming, El Paso, Texas, Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua

Tania Candiani reveals and confronts head-on in her work the pressures that women face in society, the insistence on being stick thing, crazy fad diets and a combination of junk-food ad wars and fitness fanaticism, and much like a warrior, uses everything that is most typically associated with conventional women’s ‘work’, from cooking utensils to needle and thread, to address it. In all this, the body is the main subject that allows her to call these issues into attention, that although considered somewhat trite, still concern women today.[...]

Ivan Puig, Hasta las narices 2004

Ivan Puig presents viewers with visual metaphors that combine poetic frailty with conceptual rigor. Through installation, intervention and other media, Puig creates situations that challenge our notions of reality. In Hasta las narices, a seemingly sinking car is echoed in a smaller sacle installation in a glass of milk, where relativity and the viewer’s perception is placed into question.[...]

Iván Navarro, Blue Electric Chair, 2004. Fluorescent light, color sleeves, metal fixtures and electric energy

Iván Navarro uses fluorescent tubes and electrical materials to create sculptural works that offer social and political commentary within an art historical context. In his works, Navarro appropriates the formal qualities of Minimalism and other avant-garde movements, such as geometric abstraction and constructivism, to speak about violence, energy and the media.[...]

Wim Delvoye, Cloaca Feces

Working in a variety of different materials and mediums, Belgian artist Wim Delvoye has been shocking viewers for a while now with Cloaca; a machine that emulates the gastrointestinal process and produces feces, which he then markets and sells in his studio in Gent. But he also produces large scale steel sculptures, gothic works and tattoos in his pig ‘art farm.’[...]

Marcelo Cidade, Sad Tropicalia, 2010

Marcelo Cidade’s second show at Galeria Vermelho continues his exploration of the city and its post-modern condition through sculptures and installations. The exhibition is titled Avant-Garde is not Dead, a witty assemblage of two word phrases, the French definition of ‘avant-garde’, which refers to the first line of troops before going to war, and ‘is not dead’, referring directly to the commonly used phrase in the punk movement ‘punk is not dead’.[...]

Jennifer Allora & Guillermo Calzadilla, Petrified Petrol Pump, 2010. Fossil-filled limestone. Photo credit: Florian Kleinefenn

The recent announcement of the selection of the American-Cuban duo Jennifer Allora and Guillermo Calzadilla to represent the United States at the 2011 Venice Biennal has generated quite an international buzz. They are young and relatively unknown with very conceptual and at times controversial proposals that bring attention to political and social unrest. Art with a conscious, so to speak.[...]

Juan Duque, Transmission, No Souls for Sale at the Tate Modern, 2010

Juan Duque‘s work focuses on the various ways that landscape is able to manifest itself in drawing, installation and found objects. The notion of space within a particular context, be it intimate, personal or public, acquires different significations by compelling viewers to reinterpret their own surroundings.[...]

Summer is almost over and so are the dreary summer group shows. Finally! Starting off the season, I can’t help but taking a look at Team Gallery‘s website (one of my faves) to check their program and kick-start the upcoming fall season. This month, gallery Director José Freire is presenting a film by Spanish artist Santiago Sierra. I saw the film last year at Art Basel and it’s quite the porno flick. Anyway, I’m excited Team is taking in Spanish artists (NYC galleries take note). I’m heading to NYC next week, so the show’s opening is definitely on my to do list.[...]

Pablo Guardiola searches and achieves in finding the poetic in everyday objects; a paper bag with a grease stain becomes a world map, and a simple globe toy a paradox that points to geographical uncertainties and an increasing globalized economy. The use of different mediums of representation, such as photography, installation, found objects and sculptures, is clearly just a vehicle to mediate the relationship between perception and visual representation, which in his work coincide but still remain at odds with each other.