Gabriel Orozco (MOMA, December 13, 2009 – March 1, 2010)
Photograph | Gabriel Orozco
Orozco's work illustrates our social framework decades before we’ll need a reminder of how we used to be.
An avid wanderer, Mexican-born artist Gabriel Orozco visits all corners of the world searching for objects which he meticulously compiles into artworks that, through recontextualiztion and humor, become commentaries on contemporary urban life. For example, "Yielding Stone" consists of a ball of clay rolled down New York City streets; doesn't sound like much, until one reflects on the traces of urban debris embedded into its surface as a metaphor for all that we leave behind. That concept -- can mundane everyday ephemera become art? -- is posed often enough to become repetitive over the course of the exhibit: An altered elevator, saved from a fire, situated in a room; four yogurt lids pinned to the walls, 99¢ each; 40 color prints portraying the artist's yellow Schwalbe scooter parked next to its identical twins on the streets of Berlin; a Citroën DS sliced lengthwise into three pieces, only two of which are on display. At its heart, Orozco's work with everyday objects illustrates our social framework decades before we’ll need a reminder of how we used to be. Perhaps in 2070, the items in this exhibition will seem as wonderfully odd and evocative as Joseph Cornell's found-object sculptures and collages do today.
