ART CITIES:Geneva-Vik Muniz

Internationally recognized for his startling use of materials, Vik Muniz creates stunning images, while investigating the history of art and of visual reproduction. By employing diverse objects such as toys, diamonds, industrial garbage, and minute magazine clippings, Muniz creates tableaus which are then photographed, in order to create distance between themselves from the originals items, and to bring us face to face with the illusions of representation.

By Dimitril Lempesis
Photo: Xippas Gallery Archive

Vik Muniz for his solo exhibition “Pictures of America” gathers a set of artworks inspired by the American history. From the Statue of Liberty, to the Demoiselles d’Avignon, MoMa’s masterpiece composed in puzzle pieces, to the Andy Warhol’s Race Riot, remembering the numerous ethnical conflicts that tore apart the continent, each piece narrates Vik Muniz’s vision of America. Masterpieces, celebrities, myths and clichés, everything is redrawn and reinterpreted. Through this American culture panorama, the gallery presents a selection of Vik Muniz’s renowned series, such as “Pictures of Paper”, “Pictures of Pigments”, “Pictures of Ink”, “Gordian Puzzle” and “Diamonds Divas”. As Germano Celant insists “Vik Muniz does not take photographs, he materializes them”. In reinforcing our feeling of familiarity, Vik Muniz deceives us. He wants us to be doubtful, critical and analytical. Although his pictures appear familiar, they indeed unsettle the process of identification.  The exhibition invites us to enter in the history of the United-States while simultaneously forcing us to question the various representations of the country presented in this selection.

Info: Xippas Gallery, Rue des Sablons 6, 1205, Geneva, Duration: 15/1-5/3/16, Days & Hours: Tue-Fri 14:00-19:00, Sat 12:00-17:00, www.xippas.com