We live in space yet no concept of its shape unless we give it a reference, a measurement or bound its volume in an enclosing structure in the form of a retainer to keep the medium (air) in its place.

(Richard Wilson)

Galleria Fumagalli is pleased to present the first solo exhibition of English artist Richard Wilson in the Milan gallery in Via Bonaventura Cavalieri 6. The collaboration with the artist dates back to 2004 with his participation in the group show AAVV:30, followed by the personal show “The Ape Piaggio” held in 2007 in the historical gallery in Bergamo.

Internationally celebrated for his spatial interventions that draw inspiration from the worlds of engineering and construction, Richard Wilson has been working for over 35 years making major museums exhibitions and public works worldwide. Collapsed caravans, dismounted taxis, stacked shacks and stairs that lead nowhere, are just some of the impressive creations of the artist that reflect on the relationship between art and architecture. Richard Wilson’s conception of sculpture has always been built on the manipulation of the material around him to articulate a different perspective that the expected. As he says: “I need that initial thing form the real world because I’ve always been concerned with the way you can alter someone’s perception, knock their view off kilter. And to do that I need to start with something we think we understand.”

For the exhibition “Take an Object”, Richard Wilson presents a body of new works – four sculptures accompanied by eight drawings and two postcard works -, deriving from identifiable domestic objects with their shape and space reconfigured. With his interventions the artist explores the human habitat and its components through their deconstruction and reconfiguration. The works presented in the exhibition “Take an Object” demonstrate an approach to sculpture making that goes back to a famous Jasper Johns quote ”Take an object, do something to it, do something else to it”. The sense of disorientation induced by the vision of these sculptures is given by the ambiguity between the feeling of familiarity and at the same time of newness that makes the exposed images recognizable, in part but not entirely. It is thanks to this new articulation of the material that Richard Wilson reactivates the viewer’s perception by suggesting new spatial relationships.