Gabriel Sierra

• 15.03.–30.04.2011

Circle, triangle, square: In his works for the exhibition A Trip to Vienna like Bruno Munari Columbian artist Gabriel Sierra sets out from basic geometric shapes making them the vocabulary of his room installation. “Everything can be drawn beginning with a triangle, a circle and a square. The line gives a starting point to geometry.” (Sierra)

The artist structures the gallery space by means of telescopic wooden elements, Cola de Zorra (foxtail), which are suspended between floor and ceiling and act as lines that confront the visitor with the room’s condition and establish a relation between body and architecture. At a first glance, Sierra’s intervention appears to be an aesthetically rigorous composition. But behind the added walls, a playful and lyrical space of handling colours and shapes opens up. Sierra gives credit to the ideas of Italian artist, graphic and industrial designer Bruno Munari (1907–1998): “The pieces presented in this show explore the role of the didactic material developed by Bruno Munari as a device to understand the concept of geometry, dealing with the idea that everything can be represented by geometric figures, and the concept of geometry as the only universal language to question our relationship with the world. I’m interested in how ideas survive travelling in time and from one context to another.”

Sierra’s objects and installations often humorously play with function and dysfunction and at the same time propose new, alternative uses. “For Gabriel Sierra, function follows form: In an inversion of the old modernist dictum, his objects seem as if they are useful, but just what for is often ambiguous.” (Adriano Pedrosa)