Sterling Ruby
dal 20/3/2013 al 3/5/2013
Segnalato da
20/3/2013
Sterling Ruby
Hauser & Wirth - Savile Row, London
EXHM is the artist's abbreviation for 'exhumation', an installation of new ceramics, collages, fabric and urethane sculptures. The works are acts of autobiographical, art historical and social archaeology. Ruby has turned inward, treating his studio as an excavation site where discarded, buried and collected artworks and materials are dug up and reanimated.
Los Angeles-based artist
Sterling Ruby's interdisciplinary
practice channels the conflicts
between individual impulses and
mechanisms of social control,
American domination and decline,
an engagement with irrationality
and dysfunctional psychology,
and its end result in upheaval.
Ruby's works act as formally
charged markers and allegories
for the burdens that plague
contemporary existence.
Entitled
'EXHM', the artist's abbreviation for 'exhumation', Ruby's debut exhibition with Hauser &
Wirth presents an installation of new ceramics, collages, fabric and urethane sculptures.
The works in 'EXHM' are acts of autobiographical, art historical and social archaeology. Ruby
has turned inward, treating his studio as an excavation site where discarded, buried and
collected artworks and materials are dug up and reanimated. These new series highlight Ruby's
continued subversion of both material and content. They reveal a therapeutic process that
embodies a site between creative utility and futility through the recycling of studio ephemera
and misfired ceramic works.
In his recent ceramics, collectively titled 'Basin Theology', Ruby fills vessel-like forms with
fractured pieces of his discarded ceramic work. The reuse of broken remnants becomes
symbolic of an unburdening, a redemption of past mishaps and failures. The ceramic fragments,
often resembling animal remains or pottery shards, are melded together through a process of
repeated glazing and firing. The more times they are fired, the thicker and more vivid their glaze
becomes, and the more charred and gouged the surfaces appear.
'CDCR', a large, poured urethane
sculpture in the colours of red,
white and blue reconfigures the
artist's 'MONUMENT STALAGMITE'
sculptures. 'THE POT IS HOT', with
its mortar and pestle-like form, is
reminiscent of the artist's earlier
ceramic works.
When making poured urethane
sculptures like 'CDCR', Ruby
lays down pieces of cardboard
to protect the studio floor.
His
EXHM collages take these cardboard pieces
covered in urethane, dirt and footprints and
reinvent them as formal compositions, which
Ruby finalises by inserting pictures of burial
grounds, correctional facilities, prescription
packages and other objects found around
the studio.
Ruby's fabric collages, the BC series,
repurpose rags, fabric scraps, and clothing
that are then applied to a ground of bleached
black denim. The fabric echoes the playful
patterns of traditional quilts, specifically the
quilts of Gee's Bend, and the pop-like works
of Rauschenberg or the formal compositions
of Malevich. Both Ruby's BC and EXHM
series inhabit an interstitial space between
painting and craft; industry and waste.
Ruby's soft sculptural works will hang from
the ceiling of the North Gallery, falling down
into a pile on the floor. In the South Gallery, Ruby's gaping vampire mouths line the walls;
single pillowy droplets of blood cling to each fanged tooth. Ruby's soft works take objects of
comfort, such as blankets and quilts, and mould them into threatening forms, which are at once
aggressive and playfully cartoonish.
Sterling Ruby lives and works in Los Angeles CA. Major recent solo exhibitions include the
travelling exhibition 'Soft Work', which opened at Centre D'Art Contemporain, Geneva,
Switzerland (2012) and travelled to FRAC Champagne-Ardenne, Reims, France (2012); 'Grid
Ripper', Galleria d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Bergamo, Italy (2008); 'Supermax 2008',
Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles CA (2008); and 'Chron', The Drawing Center, New
York NY (2008). 'Soft Work' is currently on view at Bonniers Konsthall, Stockholm, Sweden
and travels to Museo d'Arte Contemporanea, Rome, Italy in May 2013. Ruby will also have solo
exhibitions opening at Fondazione Memmo, Rome, Italy in May 2013 and Museum Dhondt-
Dhaenens, Ghent, Belgium in October 2013.
For press enquiries please contact Ana Vukadin at Sutton PR on +44 (0)20 7183 3577 / ana@suttonpr.com; or Maria de Lamerens at Hauser & Wirth on +44 (0)20 7255 8990 / marial@hauserwirth.com
Opening: Thursday 21 March 6 – 8 pm
Hauser & Wirth - Savile Row
23 Savile Row , London
Hours: tue-sat 10am-6pm
Ingresso libero