In a recent artist talk, internationally renowned Mexican artist Gabriel Orozco speaks with Hans Ulrich Obrist, Artistic Director of The Serpentine, about how he expands his practice beyond the usual exhibition walls and the importance of creating art that serves the local community.
Inspired by his father, a third-generation muralist, taking art to the public realm has been integral to Orozco’s practice since his career began. As part of his first exhibition at The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York, Orozco asked the residents of 53rd Street across from the museum to display oranges in their windows. “It was a way of making a transition between private / public space, between interventions in the museum and everyday life”, he says.
The artist goes on to explain how he approaches an exhibition space as if it were a landscape, allowing him to “generate different levels of perception”. As with many of his installations around the world, Orozco is known to extend his works into gardens and even bring the landscape inside such as at the Museum of Modern Art in Paris, where visitors “arrive to a fountain like if you were in a park”.
In his largest scaled project so far, Orozco was commissioned by the President of Mexico to create a “Master Plan” for renovation of the four sections of the Chapultepec Forest, connecting each of the areas to each other to encourage pedestrian mobility in the largest park of Mexico City. Unafraid of the scale, “it probably was strange that I accept to do it but the enthusiasm and the possibilities to do something like that and that there was no imposition of any sort” he says.
Now, a 400m long ‘Floating Footbridge’ designed by the artist connects section one and two of the park, creating “accessibility and communication for pedestrians and families”. Continuing his approach of incorporating the landscape, the bridge is also designed to safeguard the existing vegetation. Along all of the sections of the forest, Orozco’s project also boasts 12 new dedicated spaces for cultural activities, including a partnership with the National School of Arts with a program of educational workshops
This event is part of our Artist Talks series, co-presented with Fondation Beyeler.
