First Floor Projects is delighted to present Nachleben, the first solo exhibition in the UK of works by Mexican artist Jorge De la Garza.
Entitled Nachleben, the German word for the ‘after-life’ or ‘the later life’. The term is used by Aby Warburg, the art historian and anthropologist, relating to the perseverance of imagery, associated thoughts and forms of seeing across differing cultural, social, chronological and intellectual weltanschauungs. Specifically in Warburg’s work the term refers to the survival (the continuity or afterlife and metamorphosis) of images and motifs; as opposed to their renascence after extinction or, conversely, their replacement by innovations in image and motif.
For his first solo presentation the artist’s continued use of collage and the resulting re-workings of existing imagery found in second-hand books and other media are displayed. Via the process of initial deconstruction to the final reconstruction De la Garza essentially redirects and reconfigures from the original purpose of his chosen subject matter. By exacting upon and juxtaposing the signifiers of these chosen motifs, no matter how subtle they might be, imagery is re re-tuned and re-contextualised.
With the ever-growing shift from the printed page to the interactive screen De la Garza notes how we have begun fetishizing the book and subsequent pages and pictorial reproductions within, he notes ‘the power of the printed page’. Dissecting from discarded editions and volumes the works resonate with not just a visual, but historical poignancy. Depictions of classical Greek and roman sculpture, underground caves, mountainous landscapes are paired with images relating to astronomy, minerals, and domestic interiors. These two dimensional reinterpretations merge what were once secular images of the man-made and those of natural world into one.
A publication produced by P.A.S.T Projects, with a text by Paul Sammut will accompany the exhibition.
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Jorge De la Garza was born in 1978 and lives and works in Monterrey, Mexico & London, UK. He completed an MA in Fine Art at Chelsea College of Art & Design in 2007 and has since gone on to exhibit in London, Liverpool, Paris and Ireland. In 2009 he was selected for New Contemporaries and has most recently exhibited with Man&Eve, London and Galería Luis Adelantado, Valencia.
This is the fourth exhibition at First Floor Projects. From his London home, James Tregaskes heralds a return to the salon, presenting and dealing art in a residential space. |
