Text pieces, obliterated mirrors & tautological paintings

Parra & Romero is pleased to present Text Pieces, Obliterated Mirrors & Tautological Paintings, the second show at the gallery by the Mexican artist Stefan Brüggemann.

Stefan Brüggemann works on the language with a particular approach to the text, combining a formal process of the concept with a radical and critical attitude. As the perfect reflexion of a world, Stefan Brüggemann’s work relates to the facts that surround us, following the constructions of the Negativism, focusing more in the nihilist than the romantic aspects, that entail the end of the myths and beliefs, including the act of the creation. His work, sometimes, refers to the disappointments of our society, letting people facing themselves.

In this exhibition, Stefan presents four vinyl letterings attached on the wall (Ideology is Over, An Advertisement for Coke, To Be Political It Has to Look Nice and No More Tears), superposed by seven Obliterated Mirrors. This obliteration is an abstract gestural analogy to writing and un-writing. From the negative of the object and the fact of writing, to the idea of denial as an absolute and autonomous power, represent the concept of ‘no’ as an empty, powerful, independent and fruitful resource, that articulates in his differents manifestations, concepts such as rejection, non-conformity and absence.

In addition, Stefan will intercalate between the mentioned works a new body of work called Tautological Paintings, with the idea to apply the tautology as it is used in concrete poetry and conceptual art strategies. In rhetoric, a tautology is a series of self-reinforcing statements that cannot be disproved because the statements depend on the assumption that they are already correct. This series of paintings consists in printing in black the value of the painting in US Dollars, expressed right in the middle of a grey background canvas. The price will be printed employing Arial black font size 11pts, minimum size used, so the spectator has to come very close to the canvas to read it. The canvas will introduce the spectator into a literally space (the conceptual space), produced through the individual act of looking. The idea of the work is to be reduced to its price and it is completed when it is sold for the first time. This is the moment when the work becomes real.

Through this work, the artist creates a “concrete poetry of value”, where the price becomes in an aesthetic way which seduces and communicates as poetry. The painting rises an existential question to the viewer in terms of what do we look in an art work and what is the value of an artwork in our days? Value theory encompasses a range of approaches to understanding how, why, and to what degree people should value things, whether the thing (is a person, idea, object, or anything else). Text Pieces, Obliterated Mirrors & Tautological Paintings will confront each spectator to the way he values an art work according to these factors.

Stefan Brüggemann (1975, Mexico City) has recently exhibited at the Kunshalle Bern, FRAC Bourgogne, Dijon, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Bass Museum Miami, Schrin Kunsthalle Frankfurt, Museum of Contemporary Art Cincinnati, Fundacion Serralves Porto, Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp, Museo Rufino Tamayo Mexico city, Mies Van Dar Rohe Foundation Barcelona, De Appel Arts Centre, Amsterdam, and at La Colección Jumex Bass Museum of Art, Miami among others.