Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Ernesto Neto's NAVEDENGA: Sculpture in Fabric




On view on the fourth floor of the Museum of Modern Art is the work of Brazilian artist ERNESTO NETO (born 1964) called NAVEDENGA (1998).  Neto is known for his interactive, immersive sculptural installations using translucent, stretchable fabric.
From the gallery label text:
Navedenga (1998), acquired for the Museum’s collection in 2007 and on view for the first time in the galleries, is one of the earliest pieces from this evolving body of work. With its taut contours, rounded appendages, and soft, pliant surface, the installation resembles both the intimate spaces of a body and a fantastical spacecraft; its title, a neologism coined by the artist, recalls the Portuguese word for ship, nave.The artist embedded aromatic cloves within the structure, and visitors are invited inside its hollow chamber to engage their visual, tactile, and olfactory senses. Male and female; internal and external; weight and ethereality—Navedenga encompasses a profusion of symbiotic oppositions. Polyamide stretch fabric, sand, Styrofoam, cloves, cord, and ribbon, 144 x 180 x 252" (365.8 x 457.2 x 640.1 cm). 

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