Ugo Rondinone

Gladstone Gallery, New York
Acquired by the present owner from the above

New York, Gladstone Gallery, nude, November - December 2010 (another example exhibited)

This work is in very good and sound condition overall. There are some very faint and scattered surface abrasions visible under raking light. Some light dust has accumulated on the surface.
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Ugo Rondinone’s exploration and his development of figuration dates to the early 1990s with a body of work ranging from an expansive group of sculptural and photographic self-portraits as well as his clown series. The nudes, which were first shown in New York’s Gladstone Gallery in 2010, are a continuation of Rondinone’s existentialist exploration of the human condition.  Cast from a human body, the seven perfectly detailed and scaled figures created for this show are made of a mixture of wax and earth pigment. The body sections of the figures are cast individually and made in different earth-tone colors in a camouflage-like pattern, each limb jointed like a mannequin’s body.  nude (xxxx), a title as anonymous as each of the bodies themselves, reclines in an almost seductive manner against the wall. Eyes closed, the figure is frozen in time in an absolute expression of meditation or even sleep. The limbs rest ever so delicately and the neck is turned in a most vulnerable and exposed manner. Like nude (xxxx) the seven unique figures in this series have an Old Master quality to them. The long extended neck perhaps reminiscent of Parmigianino’s famous Madonna. For the 2010 Gladstone show, the figures were leaned against the gallery walls and placed directly onto the floor. Devoid of any context or narrative, Rondinone’s nudes appear absolutely frozen in time, in a profound state of contemplation or even slumber perhaps as an invitation to the viewer to fill the emotional void and narrative. Rondinone not only plays with the forces of the real and the imaginary but also suspends them momentarily from the present.  The affective quality of this body of work is a testament to Rondinone’s masterful and continued pursuit to reveal the strangeness and sublime of human life.