Journey Through the Gallery – Ugo Rondinone, primal

In the next instalment of our team's favorite exhibitions from the history of the gallery, Tara K.Reddi, Senior Sales Director, shares why Ugo Rondinone’s 2013 exhibition primal stands out for her:

"In 2013 for the exhibition of Ugo Rondinone’s primal the gallery space which was then at Schoeneberger Ufer became the stage for a series of new sculptures by Ugo Rondinone: 34 cast bronze horses, each individual in their form and size. The space was transformed with the installation of plywood flooring spread across the rooms of the gallery, uniting the space and introducing an active natural element into the white-cube environment. The white washed windows diffused the daylight and isolated the exhibition from the world outside. Suspended translucent discs of stained-glass clocks hung over the window panes. These colored, perfectly divided stained glass clock-faces, stripped of their hands, augmented the impression of an isolated environment, arrested in time and space.⁠

The gallery, appeared to be transformed into a time capsule, occupied by small cast bronze horses not more than 20 cm in height, each of them spread across the wood flooring and each facing in a different direction. Each horse was modelled in clay by the artist and then cast in bronze leaving the surface raw and unfinished after the casting. Both the uniqueness and the rough, hand-made character of the sculptures are emphasized by the titles given to each of the works, introducing a romantic undertone to the exhibition. The horses “names” rather than “titles”, refer to primordial natural phenomena: the lava, the cosmos, the foliage, the sunrise etc."⁠⠀

See inside the exhibition here.