Body as place, art as exile*
Bololô, the amorphous concentration of material, is a basic element of much of Frida Baranek’s work, something so characteristic of her output that it could be taken as her signature. She often employs wads of metal wiring as her material, that might appear to be junk. However, when she unravels them and adds further elements, in themselves semantically trivial, they are transmuted and acquire new meanings. In both Unclassified (1992) and BBB (1993) spatially expanding metallic clouds draw together flat metallic surfaces, wires, airplane components, air, interpretations, glances.
These murundus, another key word that resonates throughout these works, are sometimes produced from metal sheets, rods and stones. The elements vary, but the articulation of common materials is a constant, generating something distinct and significant. In other words: art.
* by Roberto Conduru, in Frida Baranek
FRIDA BARANEK
isbn: 9788589365475
language: English / Portuguese
pages: 240
publisher: Barleu Edições Ltda
by Lorenzo Mammi
Galeria Sergio Milliet (October 1988)
One can conceive and create a sculpture as a game of balance, construction, juxtaposition of forms. Or one can imagine the work as the product of an intervention, as though it were an instant (immobile, timeless) suspended from a curve in movement. The first type of sculpture expands, ideally along the horizontal, creates and constructs a space. The second delves into the depths, through two illusions of extension: the hypothesis of a past and the promise of future development. Frida Baranek's works appear to be remains, witnesses of a disaster. Their raison d'être is to be found elsewhere - an impact or an explosion that occurred in the past. In a series of works immediately prior to these that are on exhibition, the event (a stone falling onto metal sheets) appeared to have just occurred. [...]