LABoral and CA2M jointly present 'Estación experimental'
The show can be seen between 14th May and 9th October at Madrid and from 28th October 2011 to 9th April 2012 at LABoral
Caleb Charland. 'Demostrations', 2008. Courtesy Iris Editions Limited, London
The CA2M-Centro de Arte Dos de Mayo of the Regional Government of Madrid and LABoral will jointly present the exhibition Estación experimental. Investigaciones y fenómenos artísticos [Experimental Station. Artistic Research and Phenomena], which will be on exhibit from 14th May to 9th October 2011 at CA2M and from 28th October 2011 to 9th April 2012 at LABoral. It is the second exhibition jointly organised by both institutions. In the first show Auto. Sueño y materia [Auto. Dream and Matter], automobile culture was analysed as critical and creative territory. On show between 15th May and 21st September 2009 at LABoral, the exhibition continued afterwards at the centre located in Móstoles, Madrid.
Curated by Virginia Torrente and Andrés Mengs, Estación experimental presents the work of 29 artists whose work is connected to scientific research. In their work, these creators share a certain fascination for extra-artistic themes, not only for what happens in the field of reality but also in the beyond. The exhibition is made up of four sections: “Artefactos y mecanismos” [Artefacts and Mechanisms], “En el laboratorio” [In the Laboratory], “Trabajo de campo” [Field Work] and “Perdidos en el espacio” [Lost in Space]. In conjunction with the exhibition a Spanish/English bilingual catalogue will be published with an essay by Pablo Martín Pascual.
The artists who will be present in the exhibition are: Julio Adán, Guillem Bayo, Alberto Baraya, Luis Bisbe, Ingrid Buchwald, Carlos Bunga, Caleb Charland, David Clarkson, Karlos Gil, Nicolás Goldberg and Guillermo Faivovich, João Maria Gusmão and Pedro Paiva, Lyn Hagan, Ilana Halperin, Kiluanji Kia Henda, Alistair McClymont, Esther Mañas and Arash Moori, Milton Marques, Rivane Neuenchswander and Cao Guimarães, O Grivo (Marcos Moreira and Nelson Soares), Jorge Peris, Paloma Polo, Rubén Ramos Balsa, Ariel Schlesinger, Conrad Shawcross, Alberto Tadiello, Jan Tichy, Ben Woodeson, Raphaël Zarka and Björn Dahlem. Many of them will present artworks specially produced for this exhibition.
Utopias and Failures: Commonplace in Art and Science
Formal research, pseudo-science, science-fiction and paranormal events are some of the experimental terrains in which these creators navigate and materialise their works. Without giving up their capacity to investigate, the artists expand beyond the limits of artistic creativity as it is understood in contemporary culture. This exploration in parallel domains spanning from reality to falsehood is extraordinarily fascinating. Its insertion in spaces dedicated to art is complex. An artist interested in the latest technology who applies it to his/her work to achieve aesthetic results is not comparable with one inclined to research, in which the experiment is the artwork itself with such research converting the artist’s studio into a laboratory and testing ground for error and results.
Both artistic and scientific device transport us to places of change and discoveries, whether it is with a real purpose or an imaginary one. When we speak of creation as a place of experimentation, science and art have a common ground in their carrying out of experiments that question our current knowledge and in their search for new frontiers.
Science and art share a common poetics. Where do they cross paths and where do they become separate? Ethics and aesthetics are concepts that separate yet unite them: convergence points that invite both the artist and scientist to think and reflect. The latter works in a wonderful place of observation based on knowledge where rigorous procedures are followed in the obtaining and collecting of data. Artists delve into this limited field in a parallel way.
Throughout history an immense source of ideas has been investigated leading to breakthroughs or to nothing. Utopias and failures are commonplace in art and science.
