Untitled, 2010. This is the latest in a new series of sculptures for outdoor spaces in which Whiteread has substituted robust materials such as stone and concrete for the more fragile plaster, rubber, and resin of many of her best-known works. It comprises five approximately cubic forms of varying size and surface texture, arranged in a straight line.
A lot of the works that I've been making over the years have been part of a
cyclical process. Things have happened, things branch off, things crop up
that I haven't thought about. I often feel a cycle is incomplete and need
to tread the same path again. I've been teaching myself a language for the
past fifteen years, and the utilization of that language can take on many
forms.
--Rachel Whiteread
Gagosian Gallery is pleased to present drawings and a new sculpture by
Rachel Whiteread.
This is the latest in a new series of sculptures for outdoor spaces in
which Whiteread has substituted robust materials such as stone and concrete
for the more fragile plaster, rubber, and resin of many of her best-known
works. It comprises five approximately cubic forms of varying size and
surface texture, arranged in a straight line. Small linear cutouts disrupt
the otherwise smooth surface of each cube. Given that the work is intended
for an outdoor space, changing light and shadow becomes another implicit
and highly subjective dimension in the work. Two such commissions have
been completed to date – in Stockholm, Sweden, and Dallas, Texas – and
in subsequent works Whiteread is continuing to develop and refine her forms
and use of media.
Using various materials to articulate the negative space surrounding or
contained by objects, Whiteread has elaborated various approaches to
casting and impression as subject, process, and vehicle for content. Her
daily practice is based on a persistent duality: a pragmatic approach to
the materials and making of art coupled with a fascination for the
psychologically charged associations and traces of human contact borne by
and embedded in objects and environments.
In her working process, Whiteread continually cycles back on her own
history, renewing her established vocabulary with fresh information, forms,
and materials. Moving away from more literal sculptures, such as Drill
(2008) and Fell (2008), which are directly derived from everyday objects,
her new five-part work revisits the ideas underpinning Untitled (100
Spaces) (1995), also a reference for the colorful drawing 50 Spaces (2010).
Whiteread’s frequent use of graph paper for her drawings recalls the
notations of her Minimalist predecessors. Her forms, too, play off the
geometry of the grid, but there are fundamental differences from the
function-driven and emotional detachment of Minimalist drawings. For
example, Dan Flavin’s graph paper drawings were empirical records of the
components and colors of his installations whereas Whiteread’s are as
much about evocation as representation and her choice of colored paper is
as important as the drawing itself.
Rachel Whiteread was born in London in 1963. She studied painting at
Brighton Polytechnic from 1982-1985 and sculpture at the Slade School of
Fine Art from 1985-1987. She won the Turner Prize in 1993. Her work has
been exhibited internationally in many solo and group exhibitions including
the British Pavilion at the 47th Venice Biennale (1997), the Serpentine
Gallery, London (2001), Deutsche Guggenheim, Berlin (2001), the Solomon R.
Guggenheim Museum, New York (2002), Kunsthaus Bregenz, Austria (2005),
MADRE, Naples (2007), MFA Boston (2009) and The Hammer Museum, Los Angeles
(2010). Notable public commissions include House (1993), Water Tower (New
York, 1998), Monument (London, 2001), and Embankment at Tate Modern, 2005.
In 1996 she received the controversial commission for Holocaust Memorial at
the Judenplatz in Vienna, which she completed in 2000. Her traveling
drawing retrospective opens at Tate Britain in September.
For further inquiries please contact Cristina Colomar at
cristina@gagosian.com or at +44.207.841.9960.
Opening september 7
Gagosian Gallery 2
17-19 Davies Street, London
Hours: Mon-Sat 10-6
free admission