Today was a slow day at the El Escorial. Indeed, it was a day the palace/monastery was closed, but the huge terrace was pulsing with life during a lunch break for the students at the Real Colegio Alfonso XII.
By precisely 3 o’clock everyone had disappeared inside the doors and the terrace was empty.
Author: jameswagner
“Perdidos en el despacio” at Off Limits in Madrid
Artemio Made in china 2006 self-adhesive vinyl 80cm x 150cm [installation view with Barry and gallery guest in foreground]
Yesterday Barry and I went to an opening in Lavapiés with Teresa Moro, a show by a group of Mexican artists at a new space called “Off Limits”, run by two friends of hers. There we discovered that one of the participating artists was our friend María Alós, whom we had first met in New York. She showed up a few minutes after we arrived and in our excitement we almost forgot to pay attention to the show itself, “Perdidos en el despacio” [Lost in space], whose curatorial conceit was a consideration of the way we address the spaces we occupy.
One of the pieces in the show was this adhesive intervention by Artemio, a sign affixed to the wall just outside the entrance of the gallery which identified the entire show as a product. I was also able to register both the boast and the melancholy of Edgar Orlaineta’s straps from a humble pair of plastic flip-flops, fixed on the cement floor, “The world is my sole”, with their suggestion of the possibility of transcending space altogether.
Maria was represented in the exhibition with “Ejercicio de control #2” [Control exercise #2], a piece which demands of the public some behavior protocols in the gallery: Where it was possible, each of the other artists’ works was isolated in an area delineated by tape attached to the floor, and volunteers were stationed at the edge of each of these with timers and instructions for the visitor.
Edgar Orlaineta The world is my sole 2005 sujetadores de chancias enterradas en el cementa 30 cm [detail of installation]
Atocha Train Station Memorial
Barry and I went to Atocha early this afternoon, to see what the station looked like, but also to see the memorial to the March 11, 2004 Madrid train bombings which killed 191 people and injured some 1800.
Especially considering the circumstances of its origin, it is, as Barry said, the least chauvinistic monument imaginable. Texts composed of hundreds of expressions of grief sent in the days after the attack from all over the world are printed on a clear colourless membrane that is inflated by air pressure, rising balloon-like inside a cylinder. That structure is composed of glass blocks and sits on a platform or terrace overhead. The light in the empty blue room below comes from this source alone. At night the cylinder is illuminated by lamps within its base and can be seen throughout the station neighborhood.
Teresa Moro in Madrid
[detail]
We really happy to spend some time with Teresa Moro today, especially since we weren’t originally sure we would even find her while we were here. We hadn’t seen the artist since her solo show at Foxy Production a little over three years ago, when we went home with three beautiful gouaches.
We had a terrific leisurely lunch in Malasaña, where we were joined by John Thomson of Foxy, who had helped us locate the artist here and who was in Madrid himself, representing New York’s Elecronic Arts Intermix at a new media event at Circulo des Belles Artes. After lunch, John went off to participate in a panel and Barry and I headed to Lavapiés with Teresa. There we visited her Madrid gallery, My name’s Lolita Art, and were shown a number of her newer drawings and paintings, including these two gorgeous acrylics on linen.
Madrid seafood restaurant window
untitled (fish eye) 2007
two Madrid tavern scenes
untitled (jamon) 2007
untitled (tabac) 2007
It was obviously the azul hour. We were in Lavapiés tonight, walking down Calle Torrecilla del Leal toward Plaza Anton Martin, when we passed these two wonderful bars.
I took these shots in quick succession, almost impulsively and with uncharacteristic fearlessness (the taller man on the right in the second picture saw me snap the shutter and jokingly held up a small card pretending to block his face).
I had to bring a little bit of this environment home, fearing it might soon disappear forever.
hanging out in Madrid
untitled (monster magazine) 2007
It didn’t look like they were there to see Felipe III’s grand Plaza.
Madrid house
untitled (blue wall) 2007
Actually, it’s not easy finding some bright color on Madrid buildings. This small old house near the Plaza de la Paja is a little eccentric, but it also needs a little more care than it’s been getting.
Madrid restaurant window
untitled (cabbage) 2007
Restaurante El SoPortal displays its wares in the Plaza Major.
Sterling Ruby at Foxy Production and Metro Pictures
from the entrance at Foxy, a detail of “SUPEROVERPASS”
collages grouped in the rear of the gallery at Foxy
a detail of the enormous “Recondite” at Metro Pictures
more of “Recondite”, with collages on the wall in the background
detail of Metro’s “Mortar and Pestle/Torso Combo”, with works on paper on wall
I’m on my way out the door right now, so I don’t have time to write anything or even identify the works in these images, but I want to recommend Sterling Ruby‘s brilliant installations at Foxy Production, where he was first shown in New York, and Metro Pictures, whose comparatively vast spaces house several truly monumental sculptures. Between the two galleries there is work in virtually every medium, including sculpture, video, painting, print, ceramic, photography and collage, much of it of these elements compounded.
Ruby’s a master in each of them. These shows may be my favorites for the year.