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NOVIEMBRE PUBLICO
FROM NOV 2 TILL DEC 2
opening: nov 2 2002, 7 PM
The Martínez Gallery is pleased to present its inaugural exposition,
Noviembre Publico, in its newly designed space in historic
Greenpoint,
Brooklyn. The show, curated by Antonio Zaya, will open on November 2,
from
7:00 to 10:00 PM.
A kiosk by Brazilian Fabiana de Barros has been installed on the
sidewalk
to foster discourse with gallery visitors and Greenpoint residents. For
the inaugural show, it serves as a canvas for a graffiti attack" by
African-American artist Earsnot. Later, it will work as a kind of open
space, a public frame for other artistic or playful acts. The kiosk
recalls similar forums on the beaches of Brazil and strives to maintain
the same social dynamic. Indeed, this kind of social/public dimension is
precisely what this work, among others, attempts to activate in
Noviembre
Publico. The piece by Earsnot works towards the same communal
spirit,
occupying the surface of the kiosk, while in turn assuming the same
function as the kiosk itself.
On the gallerys façade is the artistic name of graffiti artist Coco
144.
The very concept of a façade plays with understandings of appearance
and
often creates a kind of portrait of our intentions. In most cases, the
façade can only hide the true impotence of what it covers and
advertises
and, sometimes provides hints of what goes on inside the building. And
in
a world such as this one, prostrate before the holy image, the word
plays
with the advantages that are in fact found behind the veil of its
general
incomprehensibility. Thus the letters that make up this word/work are
themselves a kind of visual cryptogram outside the gallery.
Inside the gallerys doors, an installation by Dominican artist Charo
Oquet and a mural by Mexican artist Mösco remind us once again of the
works outside the building, because they are nothing if not
extrapolations
of the same theme. Could it be that graffiti becomes sacrilegious if
placed indoors, like the installation of auto parts that put it in
context? It is these same discursive, conflictive and explorative
elements, between the so often and easily ignored worlds of ethics and
aesthetics as well as the inside and the outside, that provide the true
conceptual frame of this encounter between artists from the "inside"
and
the "outside" of both street and gallery. With no other clues than their
names, one gains a clear understanding of what the artists situation
is,
of which side theyre on.
Oquets work, along with that of Fabiana de Barros and Monna Marzouk
activates and make understandable this public tone, establishing its own
dynamics of coexisting social connections, local and universal, intimate
and public. Marzouk, an Egyptian painter and sculptor, transports us to
a
balcony in Alexandria, her hometown, supplanting her vision of that
citys
sunset onto the gallerys second floor. But the artist doesnt
merely
appeal to her own memory. Her urban profiles dont really present a
sunset
so much as the awakening of other lights in this interchange of the
misplaced stares and silent conspiracies between us all, between all our
interchangeable identities.
NATO salvages everyday items from the urban landscape in order to
question
and undermine their normal functions; at the same time, he uses his own
body as the last free space in which he can protect himself from the
problems of legality and power implied in ownership. Its thus that
NATO
takes a pose of popular resistance within the
sphere of street writing graffiti.
The gallerys interior/exterior architectural design was conceived and
built by designers Marleen Kaptein and Stijn Roodnat, who question the
standard white box prototype thats served as the paradigm and display
case for practically all Western art since the Second World War. The
attitudes and scruples that art critics typically show towards design
have
for more than half a century robbed us of a real debate about the
consequences and interactions that the white box has finally represented
in contemporary art - not to mention as an inescapable context for the
dynamics, positive and negative, that such design has generated.
Noviembre Publico in the new Martinez Gallery will be inaugurated
until
December 2. For more information or press queries, please contact Blanca
Martinez at 718.706.0606
The Martínez Gallery
37 Greenpoint Avenue
Brooklyn, New York 11222
t 718 706 06 06
staff@martinezgallery.com
http://www.martinezgallery.com
Gallery Hours: 12 PM - 7 PM, Thursday - Sunday
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