PT | EN |
MENU
FILTERS
MENU
PT | EN
Exhibition
Danilo Dueñas + Herlyng Ferla
12/08 - 28/10/17
Free
TUE - SAT: 1pm - 7pm

In August, Pivô presents two solo shows by Colombian artists Danilo Dueñas (Cali, 1956) and Herlying Ferla (Cali, 1984), within it’s Annual Exhibition program.

Dueñas’ exhibition, will occupy Pivô’s main exhibition space, while Ferla’s will launch the instituion’s new exhibition space in the second floor. Both artists are currently working at Pivô preparing works that will be seen in Brazil for the first time.

Dueñas practice departs from the selection and later a meticulous organization of found objects and discarded elements in the exhibition space. Doors, wooden and metal parts, old couches and a plethora of residual materials that lost their original function can be possible starting points for an installation. The artist has a special predilection for the obsolete, he often chooses things that lost their social function -or were replaced for a newer version of themselves – and became raw matter again.

Dueñas has a deep knowledge in art history and theory, often relying on references from this vast repertoire as sort of subtitles for these once disposed elements that gain new life through his process –the titles are a very important aspect of his practice.

Danilo Dueñas reintroduce us to what is called ‘reality’ by transforming the rhythm of the space and presenting a fresh gaze to things that are ordinary and easily overlooked. His passionate involvement with what surrounds him is extended to the public in the form of carefully balanced installations filled with an uncanny internal order.

For Pivô’s exhibition, Dueñas will produce a set of specially commissioned works departing from objects and materials storaged in Pivô’s large warehouse (the space that now houses Pivo was abandoned for over 15 years, and the institution still keeps many of the discarded materials from the previous occupations and renovations). The artist often makes an archeology of the exhibition space by searching in deposits and technical reserves of the institututions that invite him for materials, furniture and objects, mostly unused, deteriorated or forgotten, besides Pivô’s own warehouse, he will also walk around São Paulo’s central area and it’s many heaps of building’s rubble and debris.

Dueñas is also an university teacher since the 90s. He taught on Universade dos Andes. Universidade Nacional da Colombia and at Universidade de Bogotá Tadeo Lozano. This practice turned him into a major inspiration for younger generations in Colombia. Taking this into account, Pivô proposes an intergenerational dialogue between Dueñas and Ferla aiming to investigate possible correspondences between Colombian and Brazilian art scenes.

Herlyng Ferla, presents part of his recent research on opacity and transparency backed by Martinican philosopher Edouard Glissant’s writings. In a close dialogue with Danilo Dueñas , the younger artist’s work aims to relate ordinary object’s inner logic and the further transformations provoked in it by daily use. An important part of Ferla’s research is the act of gathering objects that later are slightly modified and intervened by artist, always informed by their original features.

Ferla will reedit a work that was a part of the exhibition “Geometria do Azar”, 2016, which is a composition made of cut glass pieces that resembles a tile floor and ,if looked from a distance, also can be mistaken by a wet surface. In this new version, the artist ads a newborn palm-tree, which still preserves the coconut where it came from. The image of this “seed-fruit” reminds us of what can grow out of things that can be move freely, like the coconut, that can float through the sea currents and some kinds of palm trees that came from Africa and adapted perfectly in South America.

The exhibitions are curated in partnership by PIvô’s artistic director Fernanda Brenner and Marilia Loureiro, Brazilian curator that lived in Colombia and worked in Cali. Marilia and Herlyng established a relationship in his home town that unfolded into the exhibition at Pivô. Loureiro is currently the curator of Casa do Povo, in São Paulo.

 

About Danilo Dueñas

 Lives and works in Bogotá. Born in Cali, Colômbia

In 1999 was awarded with the Johnnie Walker Art Prize. In 2011/2012 was invited for DAAD residency program in Berlin. Participated in many international exhibitions as Beuys y más allá: El enseñar como arte at Biblioteca Luis Angel Arango in Bogotá; Correspondences: Contemporary Art from the Colección Patricia Phelps de Cisneros at Wheaton College, Norton, EUA; Mesótica at Museu e Arte e Desenho Contemporâneo in São José, Costa Rica e Transtlantica no Museu Alejando Otero em Caracas, and the solo shows at Museu de Arte Contemporânea de Caracas (2003), Museu de Arte Moderna e Museu de Arte da Universidade Nacional (2001)

 

About Herlyng Ferla

Born in Cali, Colômbia, where he lives and works.

Among his recent projects are: Horas extra, MIAMI, Bogotá 2016; Acorazado Patacón, La Tabacalera, Madrid 2015; El cambio de todo lo que permanece (con La Nocturna), Pabellón Artecámara, ArtBo, Bogotá 2014; 6o Salón de Arte Bidimensional, Fundación Gilberto Alzate Avendaño, Bogotá 2014; El hueco que deja el diablo, Sala de Proyectos del Departamento de Artes, Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá 2014; La desilusión de la certeza o La ilusión de la incertidumbre, Pabellón Artecámara, ArtBo, Bogotá 2013; Construcciones del deseo, Bienal Internacional de Arte SIART, La Paz 2013; Sin título (individual), Lugar A Dudas, Cali 2013; Obras apócrifas, Museo de Arte Religioso, Cali 2013; Metafísica concreta (individual), Proartes, Cali 2012; ¿Qué cosa es la verdad?, 14 Salones Regionales de Artistas, Museo La Tertulia, Cali 2012;  del cuerpo (individual), Galería Jenny Vilà, Cali 2011.

 

 

About Marilia Loureiro

Born in São Paulo, where she lives and works. She knows young Colombian art scene intimately as she integrated Lugar a Dudas’s staff in Cali. She was part of the production team of the 29th Bienal de São Paulo, worked as curatorial assistant at the Museum of Modern Art of São Paulo (MAM-SP), as editorial assistant at theAteliê397 and is currently curator at Casa do Povo.

Curatorial Text

I TOLD YOU THE WALL WAS GONNA COLLAPSE

By Fernanda Brenner and Marilia Loureiro

Danilo Dueñas and Herlyng Ferla share their obstinate engagement with the world that surrounds them. The difference of just less than 30 years separating them is almost the same amount of time that marks the shift from the guerrilla activity of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), from 1964-66, to the violence triggered by the rise of right-wing paramilitary groups and drug trafficking. The country’s complex socio-political reality permeates – in a more or less literal way – the work of a large number of Colombian artists who are contemporary to both artists in question here. However, it is not possible to consider Dueñas and Ferla’s production simply from a contextual perspective.

The initial wish to bring these artists’ works to Brazil stemmed from an institutional desire to contribute to the strengthening of links between the Brazilian and Colombian art scenes through a solo and consistent exhibition of their works at Pivô. The shows are parallel (one on each floor) and intertwine at some point along the route that separates them. After working for a few weeks with both artists in the space, frequently going up and down the stairs that link the two exhibitions, the idea of a sort of national representation or an interpretative parallel between them started to make less sense.

Dueñas began to select objects found at Pivô and move them to the exhibition space as soon as he arrived; whereas Ferla brought with him a project that he had started when he was invited to the exhibition, as well as the guidance from a theorist: the poet-philosopher from Martinique Edouard Glissant. Our first contact with the artists in the environment where their respective exhibitions were to take place revealed two very distinct methodologies. Dueñas seemed to work like a stage director, obstinately choreographing the elements chosen to be part of the dance, while Ferla wandered the city attentively in search of objects and their possible relations, infused with the Martinican author’s thought.

When asked to qualify his book Tout-Monde (1993), whether as a novel, theory or something else, Edouard Glissant – who intently refused to categorise his work – said: “the whos and whats that speak are multiple, it is impossible to know where he/she/it comes from because perhaps he/she/it does not know and cannot control or guide speech. Whatever is projected as speech encounters another multiple, the multiple of the world. When you draw a poetics of diversity, which is what I intend to do, you cannot speak from a point of view of oneness” (Glissant, 2005, p 153-154). Despite their generational and methodological differences, both artists have in common the idea of reviewing – from an ethical and aesthetical movement that is equally committed and meticulous – the relationships between that which surrounds us, revealing – like Glissant – the inseparability of whos and whats.

Playing with the ideas of opacity and transparency, Ferla brought to the exhibition space the concept of ‘creolisation’, which Glissant defines as the phenomena in which two cultures are merged and combined, giving way to something completely new and unpredictable. According to the author, the most common form of creolisation is the process of oppression and dispossession, which he calls the ‘conversion of being’. Slavery is perhaps the most poignant example of this theory. Enslaved populations arrived in the new land deprived of any physical relation to their culture and language of origin. Glissant believes that the person who is subjected to this ‘state of deprivation’ rebuilds their reality from traces/residues of language, memory and artistic expression that might be common to all. The enslaved African was no longer allowed to carry out public rituals or objectively replicate daily routines from their prior lives, but it is precisely from the fragments of shared memories and affection in the new context that a novel way of being emerges, away from pre-established thought systems and beyond any binary oppositions.

By opening his practice to the impulses felt during his stay in São Paulo, Ferla highlights the ‘false universality’ of thought systems – the Christian conversion efforts of the past are not too far from the current hegemony of the technological language and consumer society. The artist brought to Pivô a project in the same way one would bring a partially annotated notebook to the field: the relationship with the lived experience is what eventually fulfils it. Contrarily to Dueñas – who builds a total environment from an essentially phenomenological engagement with the elements he works with -, in Ferla’s exhibition each object in the space has a precise raison d’être and actively participates in the conceptual network that guides the show. The set of artworks resulting from this clash between project and practice deals with the issue of the preservation of opacity as a way of resisting the transparency of the ‘real’ and its consequences: the objectivity of knowledge, the imposing of History in detriment of regional histories and the whole Western metaphysics focused on the idea of ‘self’. In one of the works, the artist overlaps a sprouting coconut to a large area installed with glass pieces cut into the shape of tiles. From this image, Ferla reminds us that the fruit drifted beyond national frontiers, adapting and modifying itself from Africa to the Americas, and that what looks like a puddle from far away, upon closer inspection becomes a new possibility of flooring.

The concept of creolisation is clearly echoed in Dueñas’ practice, as the artist highlights the visual potential of waste and ordinary objects, providing them with a new singularity in the context of his installations and sculptures. Dueñas’ exhibition is an artwork in itself. The result of the encounter between materials is unpredictable and depends on the engagement of each piece handled by the artist. It is true that the hammering makes the wall collapse but the fall always reveals a surprise*. All the exhibition’s elements preserve their original features, including the space itself; nothing was cleaned, painted, polished or undone. Things simply exist according to Dueñas’ coordinates and in a temporary relationship: the raw matter is art at that point of time, for the duration of the show, before it becomes scrap again after the exhibition. The transitory aspect – yet not imprecise – of Dueñas’ artworks and his profound belief in the poetic potential of everything that surrounds us revokes a time in History when there was no distinction between rational and mystical thought. Nothing prevails in this spatial ballet choreographed by Dueñas: his magical and theological thought matches his extensive theoretical repertoire on classic and modern Art History. The artist inhabits and makes good use of this contradiction.

In their own way, both exhibitions envision movement and, in a certain way, respond to the great challenge of ‘rhizome-identity’ as described by Glissant, which is precisely the challenge of dynamic constitution, through gaps and diluted frontiers, and no longer from a common root or a formal definition understood as universal or absolute. In the author’s words: “It is no longer the ‘universal right’ that dictates the rules but the accumulation of relations (…). The trace/residue supposes and brings with it a pondering of the existing and not the thought of the being”. Like the ‘temporary state of art’ that affects Dueñas’ materials, cultures are never permanent but are always in a process of relation: by coexisting they are mutually transformed. On that account, thinking about these exhibitions simply as a link between two generations of artists or two South American countries would be to flatten all the specificities that separate and consequently potentiate them. Therefore, we invite you to stop for a moment on the stairs that connect – or separate – the two shows, where this game of relations is possibly stronger.
Danilo Dueñas and Herlyng Ferla share their obstinate engagement with the world that surrounds them. The difference of just less than 30 years separating them is almost the same amount of time that marks the shift from the guerrilla activity of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), from 1964-66, to the violence triggered by the rise of right-wing paramilitary groups and drug trafficking. The country’s complex socio-political reality permeates – in a more or less literal way – the work of a large number of Colombian artists who are contemporary to both artists in question here. However, it is not possible to consider Dueñas and Ferla’s production simply from a contextual perspective.

The initial wish to bring these artists’ works to Brazil stemmed from an institutional desire to contribute to the strengthening of links between the Brazilian and Colombian art scenes through a solo and consistent exhibition of their works at Pivô. The shows are parallel (one on each floor) and intertwine at some point along the route that separates them. After working for a few weeks with both artists in the space, frequently going up and down the stairs that link the two exhibitions, the idea of a sort of national representation or an interpretative parallel between them started to make less sense.

Dueñas began to select objects found at Pivô and move them to the exhibition space as soon as he arrived; whereas Ferla brought with him a project that he had started when he was invited to the exhibition, as well as the guidance from a theorist: the poet-philosopher from Martinique Edouard Glissant. Our first contact with the artists in the environment where their respective exhibitions were to take place revealed two very distinct methodologies. Dueñas seemed to work like a stage director, obstinately choreographing the elements chosen to be part of the dance, while Ferla wandered the city attentively in search of objects and their possible relations, infused with the Martinican author’s thought.

When asked to qualify his book Tout-Monde (1993), whether as a novel, theory or something else, Edouard Glissant – who intently refused to categorise his work – said: “the whos and whats that speak are multiple, it is impossible to know where he/she/it comes from because perhaps he/she/it does not know and cannot control or guide speech. Whatever is projected as speech encounters another multiple, the multiple of the world. When you draw a poetics of diversity, which is what I intend to do, you cannot speak from a point of view of oneness” (Glissant, 2005, p 153-154). Despite their generational and methodological differences, both artists have in common the idea of reviewing – from an ethical and aesthetical movement that is equally committed and meticulous – the relationships between that which surrounds us, revealing – like Glissant – the inseparability of whos and whats.

Playing with the ideas of opacity and transparency, Ferla brought to the exhibition space the concept of ‘creolisation’, which Glissant defines as the phenomena in which two cultures are merged and combined, giving way to something completely new and unpredictable. According to the author, the most common form of creolisation is the process of oppression and dispossession, which he calls the ‘conversion of being’. Slavery is perhaps the most poignant example of this theory. Enslaved populations arrived in the new land deprived of any physical relation to their culture and language of origin. Glissant believes that the person who is subjected to this ‘state of deprivation’ rebuilds their reality from traces/residues of language, memory and artistic expression that might be common to all. The enslaved African was no longer allowed to carry out public rituals or objectively replicate daily routines from their prior lives, but it is precisely from the fragments of shared memories and affection in the new context that a novel way of being emerges, away from pre-established thought systems and beyond any binary oppositions.

By opening his practice to the impulses felt during his stay in São Paulo, Ferla highlights the ‘false universality’ of thought systems – the Christian conversion efforts of the past are not too far from the current hegemony of the technological language and consumer society. The artist brought to Pivô a project in the same way one would bring a partially annotated notebook to the field: the relationship with the lived experience is what eventually fulfils it. Contrarily to Dueñas – who builds a total environment from an essentially phenomenological engagement with the elements he works with -, in Ferla’s exhibition each object in the space has a precise raison d’être and actively participates in the conceptual network that guides the show. The set of artworks resulting from this clash between project and practice deals with the issue of the preservation of opacity as a way of resisting the transparency of the ‘real’ and its consequences: the objectivity of knowledge, the imposing of History in detriment of regional histories and the whole Western metaphysics focused on the idea of ‘self’. In one of the works, the artist overlaps a sprouting coconut to a large area installed with glass pieces cut into the shape of tiles. From this image, Ferla reminds us that the fruit drifted beyond national frontiers, adapting and modifying itself from Africa to the Americas, and that what looks like a puddle from far away, upon closer inspection becomes a new possibility of flooring.

The concept of creolisation is clearly echoed in Dueñas’ practice, as the artist highlights the visual potential of waste and ordinary objects, providing them with a new singularity in the context of his installations and sculptures. Dueñas’ exhibition is an artwork in itself. The result of the encounter between materials is unpredictable and depends on the engagement of each piece handled by the artist. It is true that the hammering makes the wall collapse but the fall always reveals a surprise*. All the exhibition’s elements preserve their original features, including the space itself; nothing was cleaned, painted, polished or undone. Things simply exist according to Dueñas’ coordinates and in a temporary relationship: the raw matter is art at that point of time, for the duration of the show, before it becomes scrap again after the exhibition. The transitory aspect – yet not imprecise – of Dueñas’ artworks and his profound belief in the poetic potential of everything that surrounds us revokes a time in History when there was no distinction between rational and mystical thought. Nothing prevails in this spatial ballet choreographed by Dueñas: his magical and theological thought matches his extensive theoretical repertoire on classic and modern Art History. The artist inhabits and makes good use of this contradiction.

In their own way, both exhibitions envision movement and, in a certain way, respond to the great challenge of ‘rhizome-identity’ as described by Glissant, which is precisely the challenge of dynamic constitution, through gaps and diluted frontiers, and no longer from a common root or a formal definition understood as universal or absolute. In the author’s words: “It is no longer the ‘universal right’ that dictates the rules but the accumulation of relations (…). The trace/residue supposes and brings with it a pondering of the existing and not the thought of the being”. Like the ‘temporary state of art’ that affects Dueñas’ materials, cultures are never permanent but are always in a process of relation: by coexisting they are mutually transformed. On that account, thinking about these exhibitions simply as a link between two generations of artists or two South American countries would be to flatten all the specificities that separate and consequently potentiate them. Therefore, we invite you to stop for a moment on the stairs that connect – or separate – the two shows, where this game of relations is possibly stronger.

* “I told them the wall was going to fall. They waited for the event without expectation, but they were surprised when it happened, it was strange. Three new walls appeared with their subjacent structures exposed to the world. This, by all means, never happens.” Account from Danilo Dueñas about the process of installing one of his recent exhibitions. The renewal of the fascination with known things and facts is perhaps his main purpose as an artist, as he constantly reiterates that events are always imbued with a sort of mystery and that the role of the artist is to materialise this.

0
    0
    Carrinho de Compras
    Seu Carrinho está vazioVoltar à Loja