"The Construction of Volumetric Interrelationships" by artists Courtney Smith and Iván Navarro is a project created specifically for the gallery's warehouse space in Barra Funda. Together, they examine the functioning of social and intimate spaces in a large installation composed of a sequence of interconnected environments.
Courtney Smith is known for her furniture-based sculptures and her exploration of the physical and psychological construction of interior spaces through the deconstruction of the elements that inhabit them. Iván Navarro is globally recognized for his innovative work on the implications of transforming and transferring electrical energy into luminous sculptures. Both artists share a natural fixation on domestic objects that surround human life, which simultaneously describe and determine social activity. Versions and inversions of tables, chairs, and lamps frequently appear in their sculptural repertoires. In their joint exhibition at Baró Galeria, the artists explore the intersection of their distinct artistic languages, constructing energetic relationships that merge into hybrid sculptures.
The exhibition's title is inspired by the Belgian artist George Vantongerloo's 1921 sculpture, "The Construction of Volumetric Interrelationships Derived from the Inscribed Square and the Square Circumscribed by the Circle," part of the Solomon R. Guggenheim collection and currently on display at the foundation’s headquarters in New York. As a member of the De Stijl group alongside Mondrian and Theo Van Doesburg, Vantongerloo sought pure art through geometric abstraction and mathematical principles, reflected in the rigor of his language. Although Smith and Navarro share a strong fascination with formalist ideals, they extract Vantongerloo's words and expose them to inevitable metaphorical interpretations.
Courtney Smith develops her half of the exhibition with a series of furniture arrangements placed in small spaces, which could be considered "rooms" within the gallery’s open space. Although these "rooms" are configured according to geometric formalism, each one fulfills an emotional function. The public is invited to enter the installation, move from one room to another, and interact with the objects within them. These include Smith’s elaborate furniture-sculptures, found or borrowed objects, works made in collaboration with Iván Navarro, and pieces by anonymous artists, resulting in an explicitly anti-hierarchical approach.
Alongside his collaboration with Smith, Iván Navarro presents three additional pieces from his recent work, focused on foreign interventions in Latin American dictatorships. The video "Relay" (2011) is a reenactment of an actual interview with French military officer Paul Aussaresses, who introduced torture techniques using electricity in Brazil and throughout Latin America. The video shows people cycling through Central Park in New York, wearing jackets with the words "FORGET," "PAUSE," and "STAY" embroidered with lights that turn on with the force of pedaling.
Navarro also invites his brother, Mario Navarro, to exhibit the work "Cara Metade" (2010), commissioned by the Louis Vuitton Foundation in Paris. This piece consists of six showcases with mirrored backgrounds and illuminated text, containing objects and newspapers from France and Brazil. The work offers a political reflection on the military cooperation between these two countries during the 1970s, particularly regarding the exportation of torture techniques from France to Latin America via Brazil.
In the gallery’s garden, the site-specific work "REJA" (2011) will be displayed, featuring a fence made of neon light that extends the narrative thread of the interior installation into the exterior space.
"The Construction of Volumetric Interrelationships" appropriates the contemporary and endemic legacy built by the artists, universalizing the debate between politics, art, and design in an exhibition that unites these two artists and their unique visions.
Courtney Smith (Paris, France, 1966) is a Franco-Brazilian artist currently residing in New York. Her work revolves around the concept of furniture and its metonymic relationship with the human form and function. She creates highly complex, modular sculptures as "construction kits" that can be reconfigured within fictional interiors. Smith has exhibited at PS1 MoMA, El Museo del Barrio, and the Museum of Arts and Design in New York, as well as at the Museum of Modern Art in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, the Museo Reina Sofía in Madrid, and numerous other museums and galleries across the United States, Germany, Argentina, Portugal, and Brazil.
Chilean artist Iván Navarro (Santiago, Chile, 1972), currently based in Brooklyn, New York, is recognized for his minimalist-rooted work, which employs industrially produced materials to construct objects with strong symbolic power. Using neon, fluorescent, and incandescent light, his sculptures carry a potent political and social discourse while also functioning as utilitarian objects, seamlessly integrating into the physical space they inhabit. His work has been exhibited worldwide, including at the 53rd Venice Biennale (2009), MOCA Goldman Warehouse in Miami, Witte de With in Rotterdam, Caja de Burgos in Spain, and the Towner Art Museum in Eastbourne, England. Navarro’s works are part of collections such as the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C., the LVMH Collection in Paris, and the Saatchi Collection in London, among others.
