Unveiling Inhotim (3/3)

William Kentridge, “I am not me, the horse is not mine”, 2008

In Inhotim, I still had artworks to see, the more classical ones maybe or, in any case, those whose scenography felt less pompous. First, a superb polyptych by William Kentridge on eight screens, addressing the end of Constructivism, stifled by Stalin. Except for one screen devoted to text (the 1937 Central Committee’s deliberation expelling Bukharin from the party), Kentridge’s tried-and-true style is on display here. But what is featured? Nicolas Gogol’s nose – that other characters sometimes use as a mask –, a horse (“I am not me, the horse is not mine”), a Monument to the Third International that was never completed… And a dancing Red Army soldier, but only his shadow is visible – everything is an illusion. It would have been nice also to be able to watch the performance/speech [pdf] Kentridge gave to complement the installation.

Inhotim (2/3): Of Air & Darkness

Tunga, view of the psychoactive pavilion

I don’t know if Tunga –who was apparently at the inception of Inhotim, having advised Bernardo Paz to create a museum– is “the best” artist here, and this kind of rankings are never very interesting: nevertheless, I felt that his two pavilions stand above the rest. The main one is a large structure, open on the forest, with a dozen oversized red hammocks connecting the building with the trees. In a central vault, one of Tunga’s films is on view; everything else is bathed by daylight, animated by a soft breeze, or entertained by a few raindrops. The superb installation that I saw at the Louvre eleven years ago is here, staging a confrontation of two worlds, accompanied by several works inspired by organic fluids (sometimes reminiscent of Chen Zhen’s artworks), such as Frascos expandidos from 2009 (featured below).

Inhotim (1/3): Utopia VS Reality

Cildo Meireles, Desvio para o vermelho: Impregnação & Entorno, 1967-1984

Suddenly, the asphalt feels softer under the wheels, the road seems much better, and the annoying lombadas have disappeared (“speed bumps” in Brazilian Portuguese). Suddenly, there are no more half-built, half-derelict houses, no more chaotic city plans and anarchic urban design, no more posters for fortune tellers or Evangelical churches, no more kids running everywhere. Suddenly –once you pass the armed guards at the entrance–, you find yourself in another Brazil, without chaos, poverty, disorder or corruption (well, almost). Like in Baudelaire’s poem, in this rich, calm, serene Brazil –the opposite of the actual Brazil, of everyday Brazil–, it is nothing but “ordre et beauté, luxe, calme et volupté.” Welcome to Inhotim! First and foremost a huge garden of 2000ha in the middle of Brazil (the French daily Libération titled its review “Collection d’hectares contemporains”, a play on “art contemporain”), Inhotim is the largest open-air museum of the American continent, if not the world, with several buildings harboring artworks and plenty of outdoor sculptures and installations. It is also the realization of Bernardo Paz’s megalomaniac dream; the infamous self-taught straight-talking businessman, who earned his fortune through the intensive exploitation of the region’s mines, has declared, however: “I have no passion for art, but I love gardens,” and “I do not understand art, I do not understand Picasso.”

Luminescent Specters (Paolo Gioli)

Paolo Gioli, Luminescenti, 2010, polaroid, 20x25cm

Two series of photographs by Paolo Gioli are currently on show at SAGE Paris gallery, until November 6, including these images of ancient sculptures, bathed in a green light that gives them an eerie presence.

Paolo Gioli, Luminescenti, exhibition view, François Sage Gallery

This wall of photographs will be on display at Paris Photo; to find out more about them, you can read the little book in which I wrote on those series – I will sign it at the gallery’s booth (C30) during the fair, Saturday, November 12, 3pm. Come!