Ilya and Emilia Kabakov
dal 10/1/2004 al 11/4/2004
Segnalato da
Isidro Blasco
Stephanie Diamond
Nicolas Dumit Esteves
Eric Fertman
Ross Knight
Ana Linnemann
Karyn Olivier
Juliane Stiegele
Karin Waisman
Ilya Kabakov
Emilia Kabakov
10/1/2004
Ilya and Emilia Kabakov
Sculpture Center, Long Island City
The Empty Museum: a room-sized installation that makes the exhibition space itself an object of our contemplation. The exhibition perfectly replicates a painting gallery in a classical museum with dark red walls, wood moldings and benches for quiet contemplation. On the walls, where one would expect paintings to hang, are pools of light, as if the paintings had just recently been removed.
Sculpture Center is pleased to present the North American
premiere of The Empty Museum by internationally acclaimed artists Ilya and
Emilia Kabakov. The Empty Museum is a room-sized installation that makes
the exhibition space itself an object of our contemplation.
The Empty Museum perfectly replicates a painting gallery in a classical
museum with dark red walls, wood moldings and benches for quiet
contemplation. On the walls, where one would expect paintings to hang, are
pools of light, as if the paintings had just recently been removed.
Bach’s Passacaglia, written for the organ, resounds loudly. An ambiguous
state of construction or demise presides but the overall effect is one of
calm and contemplation. The replacement of paintings by music and light
draws connections between the space of the museum, the concert hall and
the cathedral. As with many Kabakov installations, the room functions
metaphorically as both a manifestation of social institutions and a
container within which imagination and creativity endure. Taking the
museum as metaphor, the work invites us to reconsider the status of the
work of art, and the institutions that house it.
Known as the leading figure of the Russian art movement of the 1980s known
as ''Moscow Conceptualism†Ilya Kabakov, is considered one of the most
important artists of his generation. His ''total installations†have
depicted the gloomy bureaucratic and communal environments of Soviet life
while celebrating the survival and strength of the human spirit. Although
oftentimes melancholic, these are spaces that tell stories of poetic
innocence and fleeting contradictions; places where longing coexists with
imagination.
Also on View: In Practice projects by
Isidro Blasco, Stephanie Diamond, Nicolas Dumit Esteves, Eric Fertman,
Ross Knight, Ana Linnemann, Karyn Olivier, Juliane Stiegele, Karin
Waisman.
The Empty Museum is funded in part by the generosity of The Cora
Initiative at The Annenberg Foundation. The In Practice projects are
funded in part by the generosity of the National Endowment for the Arts.
SculptureCenter is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York
State Council on the Arts, a state agency; the New York City Department of
Cultural Affairs. Additional corporate and foundation exhibition support
is from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the Greenwall
Foundation, JPMorgan Chase, and the Lily Auchincloss Foundation.
Image
10 Characters: The Man Who Flew Into Space From His Apartment
Opening reception: Sunday, January 11, 2 - 5 pm
Sculpture Center
44-19 Purves Street Long Island City, NY 11101