Teresita Fernandez has had a big year. From her monumental, canopy-like installation Fata Morgana, composed of mirror-polished metal discs, which drew a record number of daily admirers to New York’s Madison Square Park over the summer, to the thoughtful installation Double Glass River which currently resides at Grace Farms, the MacArthur ‘genius award’ winning artist has become a formidable force in the art world.
This week, Lehmann Maupin’s New York gallery celebrates Fernández’s latest sculptural works, a series of veritable ‘intimate interior landscapes’ in concrete, cast bronze, malachite, and glazed ceramic.
For this riveting body of work, Fernández (who served on President Obama’s U.S. Commission of Fine Arts) turned to the Viñales Valley, an iconic and surreal landscape with extensive caves in rural Cuba, for both inspiration and palette in exploring scale. Rather than turn to marble or materials sourced from the streets, Fernández first plucked up emerald green chunks of malachite. Her mixed-media sculpture Viñales (Reclining Nude) is composed of concrete sculptural bases topped by the glimmering mineral.
'I was fascinated by the saturated rich greens and turquoise colours in malachite and the way the natural clustered formations resembled aerial views of lush landscapes; how something on a small scale such as that mineral sample could suggest the vastness of places, maps, regions, and rainforests all seen from above,’ Fernández notes from her Boerum Hill studio.
Malachite’s quixotic quality with flecks of silver is also reflected in a set of ceramic panels measuring twelve feet in length. Sparkling in various shades of green, blue, black and tobacco brown, the panels, made of some 1,000 minute tiles, are all-encompassing in nature.
Fernández, who served on President Obama’s U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, turned to the Viñales Valley, an iconic and surreal landscape with extensive caves in rural Cuba, as inspiration for its palette and exploring scale. Pictured: ’Viñales (Cervix)’, 2015, mixed media on wood panel
Her mixed-media sculpture ’Viñales (Reclining Nude)’ (pictured) is composed of concrete sculptural bases topped by glimmering malachite
'I was fascinated by the saturated rich greens and turquoise colors in malachite and the way the natural clustered formations resembled aerial views of lush landscapes; how something on a small scale such as that mineral sample could suggest the vastness of places, maps, regions, and rainforests all seen from above,’ Fernández notes
The sculptural works come together like a series of veritable ‘intimate interior landscapes’, made from concrete, cast bronze, malachite, and glazed ceramic
INFORMATION
‘Teresita Fernández’ will be on view until 2 January 2016
ADDRESS
Lehmann Maupin
536 W 22nd Street
New York
-
Mondrian makes waves at Burleigh Heads with a striking Australian debutMondrian Gold Coast emerges as a sculptural new anchor for Burleigh Heads, pairing surf-side glamour with global polish
-
Introducing the design-led Split Watches, a force for goodGood design is given a charitable spin by Split Watches – for every one sold, the company donates an hour of therapy
-
Meet the New York-based artists destabilising the boundaries of societyA new show in London presents seven young New York-based artists who are pushing against the borders between refined aesthetics and primal materiality
-
Meet the New York-based artists destabilising the boundaries of society
A new show in London presents seven young New York-based artists who are pushing against the borders between refined aesthetics and primal materiality
-
‘Her pictures looked like pictures everybody knew were the truth’: Diane Arbus at the ArmoryMatthieu Humery curates more than 400 of Arbus’ photographs at New York’s Park Avenue Armory – every picture she was known to have printed
-
Mystic, feminine and erotic: the power of Penny Slinger’s bodies as landscapeArtist Penny Slinger continues her exploration of the sacred, surreal feminine in a Santa Monica exhibition, ‘Meeting at the Horizon’
-
What is recycling good for, asks Mika Rottenberg at Hauser & Wirth MenorcaUS-based artist Mika Rottenberg rethinks the possibilities of rubbish in a colourful exhibition, spanning films, drawings and eerily anthropomorphic lamps
-
Out of office: the Wallpaper* editors’ picks of the weekIt was a jam-packed week for the Wallpaper* staff, entailing furniture, tech and music launches and lots of good food – from afternoon tea to omakase
-
Out of office: what the Wallpaper* editors have been up to this weekThis week saw the Wallpaper* team jet-setting to Jordan and New York; those of us left in London had to make do with being transported via the power of music at rooftop bars, live sets and hologram performances
-
Photographer Geordie Wood takes a leap of faith with first film, DiversGeordie Wood delved into the world of professional diving in Fort Lauderdale for his first film
-
New book celebrates 100 years of New York City landmarks where LGBTQ+ history took placeMarc Zinaman’s ‘Queer Happened Here: 100 Years of NYC’s Landmark LGBTQ+ Places’ is a vital tribute to queer culture
