New York
Barbara Gladstone Gallery
Marisa Merz, one of Arte Povera’s band of stellar sculptors (and the widow of Mario Merz, who also belonged to the group), looks to the attractions of industrial materials. She has had a long career, her first solo show occurring in 1967 at Gallery Gian Enzo Sperone in Turin. Merz is recognized for her idiosyncratic use of copper wire, clay, and wax—materials in keeping with Arte Povera’s preference for humble substances. For this show, she presented two works made with metal sheeting: Sedia, a smallish sculpture reminiscent of an armchair, and two painted columns hanging from the ceiling—both from the larger group Untitled (Living Sculpture) (1966), a title that makes a strong identification with the Arte Povera philosophy of connecting art and life. In the unpainted “chair,” silver sheets, folded innumerable times, create form. The two columns present painted surfaces; Merz’s use of red, green, and yellow becomes that much more striking when the hues are offset by the silver of the unpainted metal.…see the entire review in the print version of April’s Sculpture magazine.
