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Exhibition 28 October 2015 - 14 March 2016Sabatini Building. Floor 3

Ignasi Aballíwithout beginning/without end

Sign (image-text), 2014Courtesy Gallery Estrany de la Mota

GOBIERNODE ESPAÑA

MINISTERIODE EDUCACIÓN, CULTURAY DEPORTE

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without beginning / without end is aretrospective specifically conceived for thespaces of the Museo Reina Sofía. Itprincipally presents works produced over thepast ten years, but also includes a series ofnew works exhibited here for the first time.Aballí opens up his archives of images andwords to begin a subtle questioning of themuseum which includes references tolibraries, picture galleries, newspaper andjournal libraries, and film archives as cases ofdeflagration of the conflict between seeingand knowing. In his work, single words,entire texts, and pages torn from theirvolumes exemplify the expanded notion ofthe book as a universe suggested by StéphaneMallarmé’s maxim: “a book neither beginsnor ends: at most, it pretends to”.

Meanwhile, time turns out to be an agent thatconstructs the materiality of the artisticdiscourse: some of Aballí’s works are shapedby processes in which time leaves its mark,whether through the effects of the sun or theongoing intervention of the artist or of visitorsto his exhibitions. It is this time withoutbeginning and without end that visitorsencounter as they wonder through theexhibition rooms.

Aballí’s lists of words cut out of newspapersand arranged according to morphological andsemantic categories, the sets of images alsofound in newspapers, and the projection ofslides of masterpieces from art history thathave gradually faded in the sun, literally andallegorically cross time with history.

Ignasi Aballí. without beginning/without end


Painting is another recurring issue presentedin various ways in the show: invading thewalls of the museum, objectualised in theform of paintings, through works presentedas display cabinets or windows in theexhibition space, and even as singular echoesresonating with the colour theory thatpervades Aballí’s entire oeuvre. Paintingappears in Aballí’s work in elements that wedo not usually see, as in the case of certainwalls painted in different shades of white fora work specially created for this exhibition,and of the photographs of hanging systemsfor paintings previously exhibited in themuseum.

without beginning / without end is a furtherexample of the oeuvre of an artist who, like

Georges Perec (one of his literaryinfluences), endlessly combines thought and classification by bringing togetherinformation, colours, and forms. In it, therules of the museum institution aresubverted in a series of data and interdictionsestablished by the artist as a means ofparodic simulation of the conventionalrelationships that form between aninstitution and its audiences. The exhibitionreveals itself as a meta-exhibition, an over-exhibition, occurring at different levels, offering those who visit the exhibition a perceptual experience of the works theyencounter, all the while continuallychallenging viewers to reflect critically on the conventions that define thecircumstances of their visit.

28 October 2015 - 14 March 2016

A Possible Landscape, 2015


Sabatini BuildingSanta Isabel, 52Nouvel BuildingRonda de Atocha (on the corner with plaza del Emperador Carlos V)28012 Madrid

Tel: (34) 91 774 10 00

www.museoreinasofia.es

Opening hoursMonday to Saturday and public holidaysfrom 10:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m.

Sundays from 10:00 a.m. to 2:15 p.m. opens the whole Museum,from 2:15 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. visit to Collection 1 and one temporary exhibition(check Website)

Closed on Tuesdays

Exhibition rooms in all venues will be cleared 15 minutes before closing time

Related activities

Enconter: Ignasi Aballí inconversation with João FernandesOctober 28, 20157.00 p.m.Sabatini Building, Auditorium

A propósito de…Ignasi Aballí. without beginning /without endGuided visit led by the Mediation teamSaturdays at 12.30 p.m.

Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía

Education program developed with the sponsorship of Fundación Banco Santander

NIPO

: 036

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8 L

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-341

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Documents

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