Gordon Matta-Clark’s (New York, United States, 1943-1978) work has an expressive multidimensionality and a formal complexity in a New York dominated by the reductionism of Minimal and Conceptual Art. The artist develops his art production in the art of action, the objectification of space shared by sculpture and architecture, and especially in redefining the idea of landscape as an interactive place where the social, historical, ideological and natural coexist. Matta-Clark shows that it is possible to fuse matter, form, perception and idea into urban landscape. After a period spent studying architecture, he led the way as a visual artist, becoming one of the most important conceptual artists of the second half of the twentieth century.
Son of Chilean painter Roberto Matta, he became known by his 'Cuttings': transformations of buildings and houses by cuts which offer new spaces, he creates different routes inside buildings, exposing new materials and proposes new interpretations to those who visit them. His experimental films are also recognisable; they allow viewers to relive the visit inside the works of Matta-Clark, as none of them remain standing.
This exhibition reflects the artist's creative period between 1971 and 1977. It contains photographs, photo-collages, drawings as well as nineteen films shown as the core of his work, not as a documentary of his missing work.
The sample shows how Matta-Clark’s work is based on a tradition that begins by redefining sculpture and space from the perspective of art in action, and culminates with a final and proactive immersion into space. In this totality is where he intertwines all the artistic, visual, spatial and architectural with social and political interaction. His interest in film camera comes from the consideration that it is the most accurate way of capturing space and the closest to conveying experience. Although some of his films are based on his performances and actions in buildings, they are always conceived as works in themselves.
