English
The Museum of Contemporary Art Barcelona (MACBA) has re-edited the work by Àngels Ribé, En el Laberinto, in an attempt to spotlight the lesser known work of the Catalan conceptual sculptor. The exhibition, curated by Teresa Grandas, will be on until the 23rd of October.
Àngels Ribé is an artist well known in the trajectory of Spanish art. He was part of the group of Catalan artists who revolutionised the aesthetics of art during the 1970s, with their conceptual approach. Ribé moved to Paris, and begun to study the concepts of shape, and volume – elements which would go on to be central to his subsequent work. These were also the years during which public space started to be used by artists as a place for protest against the immobilisation, and conservatism of the big museums. Ribé seized public space in order to be able to show his sculptures outdoors, in parks, where he would invite children to climb the En el Laberinto piece.
The work marks out a path – a labyrinth – as a way of carrying out different actions, and occupying public space; filling the landscape with materials, including the body itself, as an object. His constant search for materials derived from nature, such as water, light, polyester and others in order to create his art places him in the European Land Art genre.
Land Art is a strand of contemporary art which uses nature, or a part of it, as a conceptual starting point, and also for the materials of the work. It´s also been used in reference to those who use nature in order to intervene with it on an aesthetic level. The first Land Art works were made in the desert of the United States during the 1970s, and one feature of the art movement is that the use of space and natural materials gives the works the appearance of sculpture without being sculpture – since the materials have not been sculpted, moulded or manipulated. This is a topic which has stirred up much controversy amongst art critics and historians attempting to categorise the work.
During the 70s, conceptual art often used the human as a form of artistic prop, or support, and public space, or nature, as a reference point for the work and its content. Many of these concepts were applied to Land Art, and today, body nature work is described as an performative intervention carried out in natural spaces.
En El Laberinto, as the name suggests, is a labyrinthine construction of ten meters, made from pieces of semi-transparent yellow plastic. Through the labyrinth, visitors to the exhibition can truly get a sense of Àngels Ribé´s work; a conceptual and interesting way of transporting us there through the artist´s least known work to date. The remarkable element of the show is the way in which MACBA, as well as the artist, remind us that art is always a challenge to human creativity.
For more information:http://www.macba.cat/controller.php?p_action=show_page&pagina_id=28&inst_id=29708&lang=ENG&PHPSESSID=nigkglmm9lrdjdoj5gd7gnv8g3
Nancy Guzman
What better than a day at the beach, and an evening spent at the museums – so if you are holidaying in apartments in Barcelona you can pay a visit to MACBA, and experience the work of Àngels Ribé.
Translated by: Poppy
