Galerie Nordenhake presents ‘Ein Auge, Offen’ by Mirosław Bałka at their Berlin venue.It’s Mirosław Bałka’s eighth exhibition at the gallery featuring a body of work including two monumental sculptures that reference towards two very specific individual subjects of his artistic journey: individual memory and collective memory. The artist’s work spectrum has always been linked to the memory lines, playing on and identifying with memory, manifesting personal memories putting into a context of historical memories.The artist’s humongous sculptural work completed in 2006 titled, “690 x 190 x 102,” will be viewed indoors for the first time in the gallery venue. The exhibition has been designed bringing to front artist’s vision and the large sculpture follows the same, being situated in the first room of the gallery with its sloped side facing towards the audience referring to an idea of a ramp and enabling the audience to walk upon the platform. The work has been planked with used wood. The structure is sized in a way that it will be strong enough to hold a number of bodies at the same time.This work has a stark dissimilarity with one of his earlier works showcased in the Turbine Hall of Tate Modern, titled “How It Is.” The work does not end in a profound darkness; rather it leads to an empty wall of the gallery, like a walkway that literally leads to nothing. The elevated ramp shifts its position to 102 cm above the floor. It shows the artist’s emphasis on the change of perspective with the support of a drawn line all across the walls of the gallery space. This line is calculated to be drawn at the very height of the position where Balka( who is 190 cm tall) can reach climbing up the elevation and stretching his hands outwards.Warm pieces of felt wraps the bottom of the steel legs of this massive structure to distance it from the ground where the spectator stands.The other structure titled, “229 x 118 x 75,” is a new sculpture created by the artist showcased at a relatively smaller and more intimate space of the gallery. This structure seemingly continues Balka’s work since 1990s that attributes to the individualism in the artist’s journey. The work has been developed post artist’s break with figuration and proves to be radically austere. These geometric sculptures remind the spectator of a human body by metonymy, as in through its forms and structure, measures and materials associated with it. It refers to the absent bodies that it had been supported and surrounded by.“229 x 118 x 75” is sculpted with loosely stacked terrazzo slabs, based on the measurements of the artist’s body. The work is elevated from the floor with a steel frame and smaller pieces of felt. The aged terrazzo used in the structure originates from the artist’s family home in Otwock, Poland and had been used by his grandfather who was a stonemason for gravestones. Many of his works uses his preused family home objects like these works, quoting the artist’s individual or personal memories, while also bringing in mind the collective attributions to the structures that forms the collective memory.The exhibition is on view from September 16 through November 18, 2017 at Galerie Nordenhake GmbH, Berlin, Lindenstrasse 34, DE-10969 Berlin.For details, visit: http://www.blouinartinfo.com/galleryguide/galerie-nordenhake/overviewClick on the slideshow for a sneak peek at the artworks.
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