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Jaume Plensa NEW WORKS
AUGUST 22 – SEPTEMBER 28 2024
GSA Gallery is proud to present the sixth solo exhibition of the renowned Spanish-Catalan sculptor Jaume Plensa.
Plensa’s sculptures, featuring the softly elongated and elliptical silhouettes of young women, are iconic and can be found in public and private collections worldwide. Powerful and silent, these pieces convey a sense of tranquility, with closed eyes that suggest dreaming or meditation. They invite us to look inward, discover the beauty hidden within, and develop a more honest relationship with ourselves.
The artist’s models are real individuals, often young girls, whose likenesses are captured using a laser scanner. Plensa selects young subjects for their innocent qualities; they have not yet been affected by or encountered the world’s challenges. He then processes, elongates, and flattens these images, creating a visual effect that resembles an optical illusion, as if viewed from a slanted angle. These proportions were developed during the extensive video project The Crown Fountain, where Plensa filmed 1,000 Chicago residents and elongated their faces to achieve the precise proportions he desired. This elongation adds a spiritual dimension to the faces while delving into the relationship between body and soul. The stretching effect also lightens the material, giving the works a more ethereal and sublime quality.
Plensa’s artistic approach is deeply rooted in literature, psychology, language, and history. Regardless of the medium he employs, he effectively brings timeless, existential themes into tangible form and volume. His firm belief in sculpture as a powerful medium for conveying emotions and ideas is evident in his work.
The seven-meter-tall cast iron sculpture Carlota, which was previously showcased at Vanadisplan in Vasastan as part of Plensa’s recent exhibition with GSA Gallery, is now installed in Järva, Stockholm. Officially unveiled on June 10, the sculpture will remain on display in Järva for the next five years.
Jaume Plensa was born in 1955 in Barcelona and he studied at the Llotja School of Art and Design and the Sant Jordi School of Fine Arts. Since his first exhibition in 1980 in Barcelona, he has lived and worked in Berlin, Brussels, England, France, and the USA, and is currently based in Barcelona. Plensa has taught at the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris and collaborates regularly with the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He has received several prestigious awards, including the Médaille de Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres (1993), the Government of Catalonia’s National Prize for Fine Art (1997), the Velázquez Prize (2013), and honorary doctorates from Universitat Autònoma, Barcelona (2018) and The University of Notre Dame (2024). Notable exhibitions include Fundació Joan Miró in Barcelona, Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume in Paris, and Yorkshire Sculpture Park in England. In 2018, he showcased six sculptures on Djurgården in Sweden, with the exhibition inaugurated by Prince Daniel.