Exhibition: Muntadas: (...) - August 4

Muntadas (...)

solo exhibition August 4 — September 26, 2020

Muntadas’ 9th exhibition at Galeria Luiza Strina shows simultaneously two groups of pieces that the Catalan artist has never shown before in Brazil: Palabras... (Words..., 2017) and Cercas (Fences, 2008).

Palabras... (Words...) is a project directly linked to the artist’s previous works, such as On Translation, Asian Protocols or La Construcción del Miedo (The construction of fear) series. Throughout his career, from macro or microstructures, Muntadas has been singling out the invisible media that affects us all even though we are unaware of its existence, as a “researcher of the media landscape dedicated to establishing relationships between things that remained hidden or silent” (Fernández-Cañadas, 2017). At this moment, the use or even abuse of certain terms lead to the degradation of their social value. Words ... proposes a reflection on language through the transformation of selected terms into images. The procedure refers to ontological,

U P C O M I N G E X H I B I T I O N

semiological, typographic or translation decisions, presenting a visual decomposition of the loss of meaning process.

Originally, Cercas (Fences, 2008) is part of La Construcción del Miedo (The construction of fear) specifically for the project São Paulo: Alphaville and Others. About the architecture of fear, Muntadas writes: fences, barbed wire, bars, walls, cameras, alarms, closed circuits, radars, dogs, security guards, electronic systems ... are part of the devices with which the supposed security, surveillance and protection work in new private or public spaces. The transparency of walls, curtains and the glass facades are false signs of a controlled architecture, in which public and private spaces are dominated by psychological feelings of insecurity, paranoia and fear.

We shouldn’t forget that security and surveillance are among the most prosperous industries; actually, they are a subsidiary of the military industry. As the designing and planning of prisons, it is a priority on the lists for further development in construction. Roman and medieval cities had their walls built for various reasons, mainly military ones, to preserve territories and power, under the excuse of their subjects’ protection. Urbanism was what defined and developed the configuration of cities that expanded their centers and created fringes, but at the same time, these fringes created paradoxes between public and private, between the richest and the poorest. A word of Latin origin and Anglo-Saxon concept, suburb is diversely translated under different contexts. As security increases so do paranoia as reality and it has transformed closed communities (closed condominiums ...) into new strongholds, where the security and surveillance sector finds an appropriate development territory.

The Cercas (Fences) series is made of 12 photographs of hyper-controlled facades, that Muntadas did in São Paulo. Palabras ... (Words...) will be presented as a print placed directly on the wall and as an album of prints.

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Antoni Muntadas has a degree in architecture from the University of Barcelona and in graphic arts from the Pratt Graphics Center, New York. Through his works he addresses social, political and communication issues such as the relationship between public and private spaces within social frameworks, and he investigates channels of information and the ways they may be used to censor or promulgate ideas. His projects are presented in different media such as photography, video, publications, installations and urban interventions.

Recent solo exhibitions include: Muntadas: Interconnessioni, MAMbo, Bologna, Italy (2020); Elkarrekiko loturak, interconexiones, interconnessioni, Artium, Vitoria, Spain (2019); Asian Protocols: China, Three Shadows Photography Art Centre, Beijing, China (2018); Dérive Veneziane, Galeria Luisa Strina, São Paulo (2017); ... baixa a bola!, Galeria Luisa Strina, São Paulo, Brasil (2014); Muntadas: Entre/Between, Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver, Canada (2013); Antoni Muntadas: About Academia, SFU Woodward’s Cultural Programs, Goldcorp Centre for the Arts, Vancouver, Canada (2013); Entre/Between, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisboa, Portugal (2012); Eleven, Kent Fine Art, Nova York, EUA (2012).

His work has been included in several group shows, such as: Fiction and Fabrication. Photography of Architecture after the Digital Turn, MAAT Museu de Arte, Arquitetura e Tecnologia, Lisboa, Portugal (2019); Tiempos convulsos. Historias y microhistorias, IVAM Institut Valencià d’Art Modern, Valencia, Spain (2019);

Before Projection: Video Sculpture 1975-1995, Sculpture Center, Long Island, USA (2018); Dérive Veneziane, 72. Mostra Internazionale d’Arte Cinematografica, Palazzo del Casinò, Veneza, Italy (2015); The Illusion of Light, Palazzo Grassi, Veneza (2014); Fútbol: The Beautiful Game, LACMA, Los Angeles (2014); Revisiting Histories, Kent Fine Art, Nova York (2014); Stadium, Arc en Rêve Centre d’Architecture, Bordeaux, France (2013); La metodología del proyecto, MUSAC, León (2012); La Triennale, Intense Proximity, Paris, France (2012); Free Circulation: Works from Serralves Foundatio’s Collection, Instituto dos Museus e da Conservação, Lisboa (2012).