Alex Da Corte (1980) transforms objects from popular culture into vivid and emotionally complex works for the viewer who experiences them. The piece we are analyzing today recalls the incident at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York in 1991. That afternoon, a huge helium-filled balloon in the shape of Kermit the Frog became entangled in a tree branch, burst open, and fell half-deflated along Fifth Avenue, in front of thousands of spectators. As the parade went on, Kermit's fall drastically affected the atmosphere of the celebration.

With this work, located in the center of Place Vendôme in Paris during this year's Art Basel week, Da Corte chooses to present his Kermit suspended in the endless moment of defeat. Poised between humor and melancholy or despair, the inflatable sculpture embodies the artist's interest in showing us how cultural icons absorb and reveal our collective anxieties, but it is particularly a reflection on the fall and resilience of the iconic figure.

Tread, by Richard Deacon

Thaddaeus Ropac Gallery, Marais, Paris

 General view of the exhibition 

Richard Deacon New Works

Thaddaeus Ropac Gallery, Marais, Paris

The sculptures dialogue with each other in the middle of a white landscape and, according to the sign, it is the first time that the artist presents his artworks outdoors in Switzerland. Despite the rigidity of the material, it is possible to notice some movement in Her, as if moving forward over Cape Silver. In the latter Kentridge uses the figure of a coffee pot with a certain anthropomorphic aspect.

The expression in both pieces is evident: it seems that they are conversing with each other, making room for themselves in the space that surrounds them.

Strangers Clay: Ceramics in Contemporary Art was an exhibition organized by Hayward Gallery, in London, presenting a wide group of contemporary artists who use ceramics in their works.

Lindsey Mendick (UK, 1987) unleashed her fury presenting a mini-apartment invaded by unpleasant specimens. The gallery sign tells us that the artist presents a home as if it were a battlefield, with a multitude of ceramic elements divided into small scenes full of drama and conflict: each one of them exudes humor. This tragicomic installation is amazingly detailed and meticulous: an applause for Mendick.

David Zink Yi (Peru, 1973) presents the most photographed work in the show. No wonder: it is a giant squid, lying on the floor of the top floor of the gallery. The ceramic piece, reproduced down to the last detail, rests on its own ink. It looks so very real, as if it had just come out of the water, because the artist painstakingly glazed the body of the mollusk. We cannot help but wonder if it exists like this in nature or if it is a mythological or extinct animal.

08/08/22 - A surprise can pop up on any street in the world and for those of us who make a pilgrimage for art a lifestyle, many works are discovered on foot. Precisely, on a walk around Milan, we came across a site-specific installation in the form of a nest in front of a gallery. The artist is Tadashi Kawamata (Japan, 1953) and at first glance we recognize the respect for nature that the sculpture inspires. The material looks like recycled, and the aesthetic is truly that of a nest, a natural structure that we see very little or almost nothing in densely populated cities.

This superstructure protrudes from the building until it almost connects with those walking on the sidewalk. It is a wake-up call: nature is in danger! Although it depends on our mood we have at the time we find this wonderful Nest, we can come to see in it a place to take shelter. Because that is its function, to be a refuge for the pigeons from predators. In any case, the structure carries a positive vision, a feeling of shelter and well-being... And to think that it is so simple to make that it can be built by a bird. 

Nests in Milan, de Tadashi Kawamata

07/11/22 - Anselm Kiefer's (Germany, 1945) permanent installation at Pirelli Hangar-Bicocca, called "The Seven Celestial Palaces", a title that refers to an ancient Hebrew text, encapsulates the main objective of the artist's work: his interest in religions, particularly Judaism. This work intends, through these tall structures, to portray the intention of man to reach the sky (an ascent towards the divine). Each of the constructions measures between 14 to 18 meters high and were made on a concrete base from modular structures placed one on top of the other.

It is really quite a visual spectacle, mounted in a vast space and with almost dim lighting, which only highlights each of the sculptures.

Pirelli Hangar-Bicocca, Milano

07/08/22 - A few steps from the Pompidou Museum in Paris is the Atelier Brancusi, a space that fulfilled the artist's desire to preserve his sculptures all together as if they were an installation. Thus, he used to explain, he could control the “behavior” of the work in relation to the space that contained it. Light was another of the fundamental variables for Brancusi (Romania, 1876-1957) and he was very specific about it, which is why the ceiling under which the sculptures are exhibited is made of glass, which allows the passage of light during the entire day. But, in addition to the relationship with the factors that surround them, the most important thing is the interrelation between the sculptures themselves, converting this workshop almost into a temple. Brancusi gradually assembled each piece according to the moment in which he was producing them and how he himself wanted them to be perpetuated: the marble objects, the wooden ones, the stone ones, the bronzes. In this way we, as curious visitors, have a complete vision of his work and live the tour as an experience. 

27/01/22 - Yorkshire Sculpture Park (YSP) has been an outdoor exhibition space for Modern and Contemporary sculpture for 40 years. It is located 2 hours by train from London, exactly 11 km from Wakefield, in West Yorkshire. It occupies 500 acres on a slightly undulating territory, where hundreds of sheep graze placidly. It is precisely there that sculptures and monumental installations by artists from all over the planet are distributed. They are gifts from the artists themselves or from collectors, loans, and commissions of site-specific sculptures. Approximately 100 works are exhibited and they can be admired during a tour that takes about 5 hours.

Large totem head, by Henry Moore (1968)

Bronze

Large Spindle Piece, by Henry Moore (1968)

Bronze

Snowman, by Gary Hume (2014)

Bag of Aspirations, by Kalliopi Lemos (2018)

The Virgin Mother, by Damien Hirst (2005-6)

Painted bronze

One of the most powerful presences corresponds to The Virgin Mother by Damien Hirst, a sculpture of more than 10 meters high in painted bronze, which stands out on the Lower Lake of the property. The same happens with the pieces of Henry Moore, whose pieces work as if the land were adapted to them or these to YSP. It is an invaluable opportunity to appreciate these works: the game between full and empty, the tension and energy between the different points, the materiality, the organicity and, above all, the scale!! There are almost no restrictions in terms of approaching and touching, only climbing on the works is prohibited. And since each of the sculptures has several points of view, they always deserve a circular appreciation.

A simple and beautiful snowman in an artificial pond (not only geography accompanies, but all of nature) belongs to Gary Hume. It's a childish figure where the artist explores structure and color while inviting us to imagine something else in those two simple white shapes placed one on top of another. What to say about the appropriation of the famous and desired bag of the French firm Hermès. Lemos questions the need for the approval of the outside world by the possession of the object and the security it provides to those who own it.

Finally, in this very small selection we chose Leiko Ikemura, the Japanese artist who, with Rabbit Madonna, represents a particular rabbit, with female attire and face, in reference to the subsequent report on the defects in animals after the Fukushima nuclear disaster in 2011.

There is no place that does not produce admiration and, despite the temperature and the wind, it is worth visiting in all its dimensions.