Orozco Makes Me Laugh

Some though about my visit to the Gabriel Orozco exhibition at MOMA (February 2010)

Gabriel Orozco is one of the prominent contemporary Latin American artists, born in Mexico in the 60’s. His particular approach to objects and to the craft of the arts makes him unique. I found his work permeated by immanence in the sense of objects as organism; repetition as in a rhizome, more than in arborescent pattern and in his consciousness of art as a form of eternal recurrence that exist per se rather than as a symbol.

Objects as organisms

First of all he treats objects as organisms. Two of his art works are specifically related. The first one “Yielding Stone” a big ball of plasticine, that matches the artist weight, is rolled across a city to end up with the imprints of this voyage. I believe that is gorgeous as a concept and as representation of immanence (although it is tricky to say representation of immanence!): a object that in the museum could be perceived as in mutant is mutant, so mutant that one has the felling that it will continue changing because of its materiality. Is only through movement that an object or a material becomes an art piece. The second one is the series “Spune Fin” and “Spune Stream” he is dealing with materials that behave as organisms. In the latest, he is just letting the materiality become another thing. Or perhaps pushing it to become another thing, but at the same time letting it free, letting it flow.

Orozco Rhizomatic

He multiplies images with fake patterns or patterns that are not a pattern at all. One can notice this rhizomatic “trend” in “First was the Spitting IV” where he plays with the geometric pattern of the notebook page and the random stains of his spitting with toothpaste. Less obvious, but also rhizomatic in my opinion is “Maria, Maria, Maria” where he seeks for repetition trough sound and memory.

Orozco the Joyfull

Furthermore I believe that Orozco is an artist concern with the concept of immanence, because of his joyfulness and playfulness. Some times his art is just a gesture almost a joke, as he would say a moment of awareness, a moment of complex happiness “Yogurt Caps”, “Empty Shoe Box”, “Elevator” or “La Ds” are some examples of this approach. He disclosures his research, he knows that he is very good with the craft of art but at the same time he is aware that the core of art is elsewhere I dare to say that this artist understands that art exists per se, that it is not a symbol of nothing.

Susana

Gabriel Orozco

(This post is a reminder that the Orozco retrospective at MoMA will end on March 1, 2010.)

Gabriel Orozco: "One thing that I’ve had to learn as an artist – considering how everything that I had learned about what art should be and what art was, and what an artist should be like (disciplined, following the love of the craft) – was that this didn’t work for me. Suddenly I had to take all of these notions apart, because they weren’t mine, they weren’t enough for me; they bored me and threw me into despair. It was a system that really didn’t work for me. Realizing this gave me a very different vision; I think it has repercussions in the way in which my pieces started to turn out, because I understood at last that my urgent struggle was to find something that was not art. In that sense, I’m not sure if people who consider themselves 'educated' understand what art is; I think not. I saw that 'educated' people as well as 'ignorant' ones immediately viewed my work with disapproval: the yogurt lids, the balls of Play-Doh. With ignorant people, it’s obvious that you have to try to destroy their prejudices, but with educated people it’s the same thing, you also have to destroy their prejudices – and their judgment. In their case, it’s a prejudice regarding what they ask of and from art. But as Borges said, we don’t know what art should be, and we don’t need to find out, either; what we seek is to understand the reason why art exists."