Adrián Villar Rojas
The Evolution of God
September 2014–Summer 2015
High Line at the Rail Yards
New York
High Line Art presents a new, site-specific sculptural work by acclaimed artist Adrián Villar Rojas within the High Line at the Rail Yards. Fueled by interests in disappearance and memory, Villar Rojas makes work that layers clashing temporalities, revealing ecological concerns and a fascination for the “deep time” history of our planet. His sculptures and installations resemble archeological sites where the future is simultaneously excavated and entombed. As his works incorporate a mixture of animal, mineral, and vegetal ingredients, their metamorphosis over time inherently reflects the material qualities of each of these primordial elements. His sculptures exhibit an animal growth, decay, and repose; a vegetal sprouting and composting; and a mineral, tectonic cracking and settling.
For the High Line, the artist presents The Evolution of God, a site-specific installation composed of thirteen abstract sculptures which punctuate the wild, self-seeded landscape of the High Line at the Rail Yards, and creates a sculptural progression and a rhythmic sequence of forms, reminiscent of a musical score. This new project extends the artist’s own traditional treatment of materials, by integrating organic elements such as seeds, vegetables, and other perishable components inspired by the natural landscape on the High Line as well as non-perishable items such as clothing, sneakers, and rope. Seemingly sturdy, the sculptures will instead turn into living organisms, revealing the passage of time through vegetal sprouts and tectonic cracks, which will slowly return the sculptures to the surrounding landscape.
About the artist
Adrián Villar Rojas (b. 1980, Argentina) lives and works in Rosario, Argentina. Recent solo exhibitions include Los Teatros de Saturno, kurimanzutto, Mexico City (2014); Today we reboot the planet, Serpentine Galleries, London (2013); The Work of the Ocean, Foundation 11 Lijnen, Belgium (2013); Before My Birth, Arts Brookfield with the New Museum of Contemporary Art, World Financial Center Plaza, New York (2012); and Poems for Earthlings, SAM ART Projects, the Louvre Museum, Paris (2011). Villar Rojas has been the recipient of numerous awards including The Zurich Art Prize at the Museum Haus Konstruktiv (2013); the 9th Benesse Prize in the 54th Venice Biennale (2011); the Nuevo Banco de Santa Fe Scholarship for Young Artists (2006); and the first prize in the Bienal Nacional de Arte de Bahía Blanca at the Contemporary Art Museum of Bahía Blanca.
Collaborators: Nicolas Panasiuk, Ariel Torti, Javier Manoli, Mariana Telleria, César Martins, Laura Langer, and Noelia Ferretti.
About High Line Art
Presented by Friends of the High Line, High Line Art commissions and produces public art projects on and around the High Line. Founded in 2009, High Line Art presents a wide array of artwork including site-specific commissions, exhibitions, performances, video programs, and a series of billboard interventions. Curated by Cecilia Alemani, the Donald R. Mullen, Jr. Curator & Director of High Line Art, and produced by Friends of the High Line, High Line Art invites artists to think of creative ways to engage with the uniqueness of the architecture, history, and design of the High Line and to foster a productive dialogue with the surrounding neighborhood and urban landscape.
