In Room 1 Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall presents works from or relating to the collection during the spring 2004. "Three Laughing at One", 2001, was the last work to leave Muñoz' studio when he died suddenly in 2001. The work is typical of his oeuvre in latter years.
Juan Muñoz was born 1953 in Spain but travelled extensively and was influenced by the London and New York art scenes. The relationship between the room, the sculptures and the viewer was crucial to Muñoz. The viewer becomes a part of the work, perhaps even switching roles with it. By including human figures Muñoz gave his works a narrative quality. He was criticised for being a story-teller, but embraced the criticism and said that his figures were perhaps characters looking for an author. In "Three Laughing at One" two of the men have a dice in their mouths. Perhaps they are planning or have already pulled a trick. To Muñoz art was all about creating illusions.
>Juan Muņoz, 1953 - 2001, Spain
"The spectator becomes very much like the object to be looked at, and perhaps the viewer has become the one who is on view."
In Room 1 Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall presents works from or relating to the collection during the spring 2004. The exhibitions will run for a shorter time than the other exhibitions. One or a few works, by a single artist, will be shown at each time.
"Three Laughing at One", 2001, was the last work to leave Muuņoz' studio when he died suddenly in 2001. The work is typical of his oeuvre in latter years.
Juan Muņoz was born 1953 in Spain but travelled extensively and was influenced by the London and New York art scenes. He started working figuratively in the 1980s. Before then, he had used sound and architecture in his work. He would install a balcony on a wall, a spiral staircase or part of a banister in a room, and could evoke the feeling that someone had just left or was about to enter. When these stage-like places were peopled, it was like a complement to his choreography. His figures often appear self-absorbed, or, when several figures are grouped together, as though they are so engrossed in one another that the viewer is excluded. The relationship between the room, the sculptures and the viewer was crucial to Muņoz. The viewer becomes a part of the work, perhaps even switching roles with it.
Muņoz was interested in the limitations of sculpture and the difference between how we perceive a living person and a sculpture. He claimed that the more realistic a sculpture was, the less inner life it seemed to have. He focused on that difference by making the figures in his compositions slightly smaller than life. His sculptures are often prompters, ventriloquist dolls or have an Asian appearance, at the same time their features and gestures are completely generic. In consequence, they never feel specific as portraits, even though they are realistic.
By including human figures in his works Muņoz gave them a narrative quality. He was criticised for being a story-teller, but embraced the criticism and said that his figures were perhaps characters looking for an author. Muņoz himself was a published author of both criticism and essays. His titles and subject matter often refer to drama, history, poetry and fiction. A recurrent theme in both his sculptures and writing was card tricks. One of his works, for instance, is a card table where hidden playing cards kept popping up unexpectedly ("Table with Hold-Out", 1994). In "Three Laughing at One" two of the men we see have dice in their mouths. Perhaps they are planning or have already pulled a trick. Muņoz described his works as sleight-of-hand tricks and said that art was all about creating illusions: "For me, what you see is not what it seems to be."
Elisabeth Millqvist, assistant curator, Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall
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References: "Juan Muņoz" by Neal Benezra, Olga M Viso, Michael Brenson, Paul Schimmel. Published by The Art Institue of Chicago and Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden.
224 pages. Color, only in English.
ISBN 0-226-04290-1 (hardcover) ISBN 0-86559-190-3 (soft cover)
Sculpture and paradox by Neal Benezra
"A fully three-dimensional history must include his work as a curator, critic, essayist, and in his writings, the titles of his sculptures, and the references he makes to art history, literature, music, and the theater, he has consistently focused on topics that are riddled with paradox. Whether examining the Aztec masterpiece Coatlique, Jacob Epstein's "Rock Drill", the quasifictional "La posa", the writings of T.S. Eliot and Jose Luis Borges, or iconoclasm, card tricks, and children's cartoons, Muņoz has concentrated on objects or forms of cultural experience that derive their power and meaning from absence, memory, and paradox."(...)
Excerpt from the text "Sculpture and Paradox", 2001 by Neal Benezra from "Juan Muņoz", (p. 50-51).
WORK IN THE EXHIBITION
"Three Laughing at One", 2001.
Polyester resin, 200 x 130 x 60 cm
