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JOSÉ LUIS LANDET: MATERIALISM OF A WASTE

Materialism of Waste
A Look into Landet’s Universe
Section 11: Compost

This is a technique that creates the necessary conditions for decomposers to produce a high quality fertilizer from organic waste.

José Luis lives from cultural residues. Through his practice, he builds in a constant and rhythmic way a great soil —ATLAS—, steadily unfolding in multiple directions.

This soil admits all kinds of sources: painting, literature, letters, photographs, encyclopedias, etc. The movements produced during his quest for symbolic materials are what oxygenates this soil, the support on which he develops his work.

Residues are shredded systematically everyday, contributing to the fragmentation and decomposition of the symbolic matter. This behavior facilitates the assimilation of new attributes to his own universe: the liberation of original forms.

Landet’s soil is a big mantle of organic matter created by himself. It’s not an exaggeration to think that its area spreads throughout the whole surface of the Earth, since there’s no interruption between its production and reproduction. The artworks are its living matter. Each piece of “waste” he finds is replicated in an infinity of shapes and matters.

Materialism of Waste features a small part of Landet’s Universe. Jose Luis’ first gesture is the fragmentation of paintings made by amateur artists between the 1940’s and the 1970’s, which he buys in flea markets. Once he has cut them, he arranges these pieces to his will: color, shape, signature, texture, topic, etc. Then, he pastes, keeps on cutting, sets on fire, sands down, paints, draws or immerses these pieces… He makes all these operations to vindicate these authors, forgotten and erased by hegemonic history. José Luis shines a light on them.

In a canvas, the areas that suffer the most from the passing of time are the edges, which usually end up marked and rusty because of the nails.

Landet rescues these remainders and puts together a new narrative; these edges are the backbone of Materialism of Waste:

Maps of landscapes drawn and painted on their own surface that keep on exploring their inner sides in search of symbolic matter. A loop that loops on itself and becomes infinite.

Lucila Gradin

VARIATION. NOLI ME TANGERE: CLARA SÁNCHEZ SALA

A navel is like a knot. But the knot is a closed connection, like the symbol of infinity, where time is eternal. However, time does not cease in this carnal knot,: its shape and texture change with the different stages of life, reminding you that your time is finite.
Five centuries ago the navel was a burning issue for theologians and painters. If neither Eve nor Adam had been born of woman, there was no reason for the remains of their umbilical cord to exist, that is, for them to have navels. But if they lacked them, were they not imperfect as human beings?
While theologians disputed, painters tried not to compromise. They simply increased the size of the vine leaves to hide at the same time the genitals and navels of Adam and Eve.
In the Paleolithic, this did not seem to be a dilemma of concern. In various excavations, several “venus” have been found with a notorious and deep navel in the abdomen, just as if time had been the same for them as for any mortal.
Perhaps this umbilical debate is not only a merely temporal question, but a reflection of a concrete concern in a specific time and space.
This form of umbilical time, on the one hand eternal, but on the other perishable, is what seems to have also permeated the historicization of the arts, in which artists bear historical witness to the spirit of their time and their society.
Noli me tangere explores the representation of the human body, (after all, it is the subject capable of suffering any situation and confronting it), from erotic forms such as navels, breasts and lips from a classical point of view, but also current, historical or cultural. The naked lips of a classical Greek bust painted with lipstick that further emphasize its nudity, several bronze navels connected by chains as umbilical cords knotted together, which hinder the viewer, or the print of a woman’s breasts made at the moment of knowing her state of pregnancy are some of the pieces that establish a dialogue focused on the human aspects that are hidden within the systems of temporal interpretation.
Likewise, the title of the project Noli me tangere (Do not touch me), are the words that Jesus Christ addresses to Mary Magdalene after his resurrection, because his body no longer belongs to that time or that space, but beyond that, it also alludes to an action that continues in time (Do not hold me), let time pass.

VARIATION is a collaborative project by Galerie Sator and NF/NIEVES FERNANDEZ that aims to broaden artist’s international visibility trough solo proposals in Madrid and Paris.
‘Noli me tangere ‘ is the first edition of VARIATION and takes place in Paris, in the Galerie Sator space, from Saturday October 15th until Saturday October 22nd.

ÂNGELA FERREIRA. REALISTIC MANIFESTO (GABO´S FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES OF CONSTRUCTIVIST PRACTICE)

The exhibition Realistic Manifesto by Ângela Ferreira brings to the fore the idea of recycling in a complex intertwined set of ways. In the first instance, the artist literally recycles machinery, furniture and architectural structures which hail from her own daily life movements, but which are no longer in good working order: wood workshop tools, home gas appliances, laboratory support table and burglar bars. Secondly, the works draw from her continuing study of the Russian constructivist art project and its utopic, avant-garde proposals for political art making in the early 20th century. In this instance the artist references the oeuvre of Naum Gabo (1890-1977), who searched for perfection in the three-dimensional study of time, space and line. The title of the exhibition borrows from his manifesto co-authored with Antoine Pevsner. The manifesto was read out at the opening of an exhibition with Gustav Klucis in Moscow on the 5th of August 1920, and distributed as a poster.Finally, the artist also draws from her own personal archive, by reprinting old portraits of herself wearing her sculptress’ attire – a worker’s jump suit. The photos were taken in the courtyard of the Michaelis School of Fine Art at the University of Cape Town, circa 1980. She is seen enacting sign language with red plexiglass circles similar to the ones used in the new sculptures in this exhibition.

This series of works and the issues they point to: workers movements, gas supplies, geographic lines, revolutions, prisons and freedom began during a trip to Chile. A voyage to Punta Arenas in the Straights of Magalhães to investigate the legacy of the circumnavigation revealed the first moments of the recent political upheavals which led to a new Chilean constitution – shown here in the film Mas Pesado que o Céu (2021).

The exhibition will leave us with questions that point to today’s European geopolitics. What kind of political meaning can we draw from this new turn in assemblage-like abstract sculptures?

ÂNGELA FERREIRA ON REALISTIC MANIFESTO

CHIHARU SHIOTA. IMPERFECT GAME.

Cards are only identifiable from one side. The players only know their own cards and do not have access to all probabilities. In game theory they are characterized as games of “imperfect information” opposed to the ones which have no hidden information and are based on strategies.

In life we make all our decisions based on imperfect information. We cannot see inside peoples’ heads, we cannot even understand our own thinking clearly. Constantly our path is changing, and we must react to it.

There is no win in the end, but the losses can be huge. So some of us ironically and anxiously refer to cards of all things to reveal our unknown destiny to us. But we can never know what our fate will be, much less influence it. We can only take it lightly and try to enjoy the game.

EDUARDO CHILLIDA. HOMENAJE A PILI Y A EDUARDO | NF/ 45 años

Further information here

INTERLUDIO 4: TEMPLO-PLADUR. CLARA SÁNCHEZ SALA.

_{The nude does not simply represent the body, but relates it, by analogy, to all structures that have become part of our imaginative experience}

_{Kenneth Clark (1956)}

Templo-Pladur generates a parallel between the idea of ​​immortality present in the nudes of the Greek gods with that of the exhibition spaces in the sense that places are designed where the pieces seem to be presented for eternity.

Constant and ancestral has been the relation between architecture and the human body.

In ancient Athens, a harmony between flesh and stone seemed to reign, not only the arrangement of temples and cities obeyed the way in which the Greeks conceived the human body, but they had turned nudity into an object of admiration.

The human figures in the Parthenon’s frieze show the nakedness of perfect young bodies in an unearthly way, thus alluding to an immortal reality. This visual experience that dignifies and heroizes is similar to that described by Brian O’Doherty in his essay Inside the White Cube: The ideology of the gallery space in which he interprets the space of modern galleries as a place built with the aim of generating the viewer the feeling of being outside of time, or beyond it. As if the work already belonged to posterity, or was in limbo.

The title of the project refers to the sacred building, but also mentions the construction material currently used for the cladding of ceilings and walls with the intention not only of generating a temporary mismatch, but also of putting in contact the idea of ​​architectural undressing or dressing the gallery walls. The naked exhibition space is as perfect as the body of the Greek gods, the arranged works seem as eternal as the hard flesh of the sculptures that dress and cover the architecture of the place.

Templo-Pladur brings together the architecture of the art galleries and the nudes of the Greek gods, so unreal and impossible that they seem dressed in stony flesh, through the act of dressing the space with works of art.

Templo-Pladur is the fourth edition of Interludios, a set of short-term exhibitions at NF/ NIEVES FERNÁNDEZ, whose proposal is to create a visibility space for projects thought by the artists, whether or not represented by the gallery, and which until then have not have been possible.

Clara Sánchez Sala (Alicante, 1987) has a degree in Fine Arts from the UCLM, Cuenca; a Masters’ degree in Photoespaña Theory of Photography and Artistic Projects from the UEM, Madrid and a Masters in Research in Art and Creation from the UCM, Madrid. She has participated in numerous national and international exhibitions, among which at the Fundación Juan March: Museo de Arte Abstracto, Cuenca; Centro de Arte Dos de Mayo, Madrid; Fundación Marso, Mexico City, Mexico; Museu Nacional Soares Dos Reis, Porto; Fundación Otazu, Pamplona; La Laboral, Gijón; EACC, Castellón and Centro Cultural Conde Duque, Madrid. Her works belongs to collections such as DKV, CA2M and Fundación Otazu, among others.

DANIELA LIBERTAD. ENTRE EL ENCIMA Y EL DEBAJO.

Entre el encima y el debajo [Between the Above and the Below] is Daniela Libertad’s first solo exhibition at NF/ NIEVES FERNÁNDEZ. The exhibition, composed by large-format drawings, video and sculptures, raises various reflections that range from how Libertad constructs her images at the crossroads between drawing and fabric until the possibilities of discovering a new color.

The paper support and its materiality occupy a place of importance for the conformation and understanding of the pieces, once the artist reconfigures it multiple times, drawn, woven, overflowed, resisting or yielding to the relationship with other materials such as thread, yarn or metal.

On the other hand, color is also a fundamental element present in the works of Daniela Libertad, that she explores to a point of spatial materialization. Color abounds and mixes, juxtaposes, turning into an almost physical feature, in a gesture that stretches the limits of the merely flat plastic understanding of it, to provide it with body and materiality in contours, textures, volumes. Colors compose and shape weaving, but they also take on a kind of life in a dreamlike field, as is the case with the audiovisual work in the exhibition, in which a new color exists as a memory and possibility and in which the narration what the artist does of the encounter with a new color lets us see that the only possible place for its existence is the space of the word.

This exhibition is part of the program at APERTURA Madrid Gallery Weekend 2021. Gallery’s special hours: Thursday (09/sep) from noon to 8 pm, Friday and Saturday (10-11/sep) from 11 am to 8 pm and Sunday (12/sep) from 11 am to 2 pm.

TALK with Daniela Libertad, Patricia Martin and Sofía Mariscal.

3D VISIT TO THE EXHIBITION

FRITZIA IRÍZAR. CHICXULUB, ESTUDIOS EN UN PAISAJE.

NF/ NIEVES FERNÁNDEZ presents the exhibition “Chicxulub, studies in a landscape”, by Fritzia Irízar. The artist investigates the Chicxulub crater in Yucatán, to establish a link between the impact of a meteorite 66 million years ago with the SARS Cov 2 pandemic.

Analyzing history and disappearance of the weakest species, Fritzia Irízar reflects on the use of power and the specific circumstances in which it dictates on the collective natural environment based on economic benefit, generating situations in which ethics and respect for community life loses all its value.

Fritzia Irizar has exhibited in several international institutions such as the MUAC, Museo Ex Teresa Arte Actual, Sala Siqueiros and Museo Rufino Tamayo in Mexico City, the Orange County Museum of Art in Santa Ana, CA2M (Centro de Arte 2 de Mayo) in Madrid, Headlands Center for the Arts in San Francisco, CIFO Fundación Fontanals Cisneros in Miami, Giorgio Cini Foundation in Venice, Seattle Art Museum in Seattle, Fundación Banco Santander in Madrid, Beirut Museum of Art (BeMA) in Beirut and the Rashid Karami International Fair in Tripoli. She has also participated in different biennials: the 9th and 10th Mercosur Biennial in Porto Alegre, the 12th FEMSA Biennial in Monterrey and the 14th Cuenca Biennial.
Her work can be found in collections such as JUMEX, Mexico; Isabel y Agustín Coppel Collection, Mexico; Servais Collection, Belgium; Colección Olor Visual, Spain; Braddock Collection, USA; Proyecto Bachué, Colombia; CIFO Collection, USA; Fondazione Benetton, Italy; and CA2M, Spain.

66 million years ago on the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico, a meteorite struck the earth. This phenomenon led to the extinction of the species that reigned on earth and determined the beginning of a new order in the life of the planet. Few times, beyond fiction, has life suffered a global attack like the one we all live this year, a specific and direct attack on our species, selective and almost with the design of a macabre experiment that has already changed us all.

There is no doubt that in order to understand our present and to be able to imagine our future, it is essential to study our past, even the most distant of which there is only a record between rocks or under the sea, as is the case of the Chicxulub crater.

Looking for clues in the most catastrophic past of our planet, I reached the center of the Chicxulub crater in Yucatán, wishing to allow myself to think about a possible future, armed with simple observation instruments, searching for clues, but at the same time transforming a magnifying glass into a sphere of divination. The crater at first glance is only a landscape, one marine and the other jungle, but in a context like that of the pandemic we are living in, it is an oracle. 66 million years ago the strongest and largest species perished, today the attack is for the weak, but not the weak by force of nature, the weak victims of the systems, victims of massive poisoning for money or food productivity, victims from their circumstances from which it is almost impossible to escape.

The landscape as a living entity suffers from the control exercised by groups in an authoritarian position, something like what Foucault names as pastoral power, referring to the shepherd, the guide of the sheep, who has control of where and where to go. Well, the French philosopher makes a comparison of that power exercised by the church and sentences contemporary life with the idea that this same authoritarian control has been prolonged in the modern state.

This project mainly questions that use of pastoral power exercised by the state and privileged groups over the rest of the inhabitants, but especially portrays specific circumstances in which this power dictates and decides on the collective natural environment, making use of tools of control such as economic to obtain immediate benefits, particular situations where ethics and respect for community life and the future of it lose all its value, leaving all decisions to economic or political criteria, the true pastors of our times.

An exhibition of return to the essential, made up of drawings, installations and photographs about the landscape, its desire for confinement, its transformation, its exploitation and its mourning.

Fritzia Irízar, 2021

INTERLUDIO 3: FARDOS. PIPO HERNÁNDEZ RIVERO.

“Fardos offers the appearance of almost a parcel or customs hall. With packaging ready to ship, in an in-pass that seems to condemn them to an eternal territory of transit. A useful paradox if you remember that Interludios is a valuable flash project. I pretend a climate of intense waiting as Fardos [bundles] reflects on the Deadlock, in the minimum deadlock that invites us to inhabit Interludios. Bulks made almost in the manner of makeshift rafts. ‘Rig with whatever you have’ seemed to promote Reinhard Mucha. Perhaps I too hope to put back on the table The problem of the background and the form in the architecture of Baroque. Maybe I have just tried to make sure that things fit in the truck, come and go reasonably safely and that in the room the pieces do not fall below the ground. In any case, the bundles exercise their beauty table, they contain their plan. They are configured halfway through the survival kit, the micro-narratives in distress or the bullets of Style awaiting the deployment of their variables. We know that beauty according to conservatives not only has to be Darwinian (beauty as the appearance of the best adapted), but also – and therefore, in terms of the culture of hedonistic masochism that assists us – it should be gymnastic. ‘Art has to fit’ Roger Scruton could whisper to us now. If anyone wants to consider Fardos a resolutely conservative exhibition, go ahead. After all, Fardos inhabits the third edition of Interludios and the later only seeks to keep its brief span of time in shape.”

Pipo Hernández Rivero

LA NOCHE MÁS CORTA

LA NOCHE MÁS CORTA is a group exhibition organized by Galería Aural and NF/ NIEVES FERNÁNDEZ that emerges as a collaborative proposition, opening a dialogue between artists from both galleries around the idea of ​​transformation in creative and artistic processes. As an effort to stimulate new forms of art production and display, the exhibition is carried out in a transversal and concomitant way between the three locations of the galleries in Madrid and Alicante with works arranged organically among them, taking conceptual and aesthetic criteria first instead of galleries’ representation, as a real exercise of institutional synergy.

With a selection of works by Alexej Meschtschanow, Fernando Sinaga, Jordi Teixidor, José Luis Landet, José Maldonado, Judith Egger, Máximo González, Pipo Hernández Rivero, Tamara Arroyo and Urs Lüthi, LA NOCHE MÁS CORTA explores transformation as a process of resignification that promotes regeneration, transmutation, change and renewal, considering the current difficult times and in reference to the traditions of San Juan, when the old and obsolete are burned to give way to the new, renewed and transformed.

In this sense, the artworks presented respond to the proposal by having undergone some transformation or by representing it conceptually both voluntarily and involuntarily, that is, works that have been started and then left for a while, until they were reconfigured for conclusion; works that are the appropriations of other objects, transformed into something else; or works that represent the displacement of the nature of something or the change in its initial idea, sense or meaning.