Gabriela Albergaria at Bitforms Gallery
Gabriela Albergaria
Fictional landscape/view with Betula Pubescens and Liriondendron tulipifera (detail)
(Oxford Botanic Garden, UK), 2011 giclee print and drawing on paper 78.74 x 61.42″ / 200 x 156 cm
unique
Bitforms Gallery is hosting “Birdwatchers”, a group exhibition featuring work of four contemporary artists that observe nature and repurpose it within altered landscapes, as part of their interdisciplinary practice.
The Birdwatchers – introducing artworks by Gabriela Albergaria, Jeffrey Blondes, Adriana Salazar, and Marina Zurkow, artists of different backgrounds and using various techniques – represents how the division between nature and art has been continually challenged and re¬assessed. The featured artworks include electronically animated plants and ani¬mals, digital film, animation, letterpress prints, and drawing on paper, from four contemporary artists that, as part of their interdisciplinary practice, observe nature and repurpose it within altered landscapes.
Gabriela Albergaria’s projects are the consequence of an intense connection with gardens and trees. Her drawings are concerned with the relationships between the subtle and minute components of life and the large-scale appearance of the natural world. In her piece Fictional Landscape (2011) introduced at this exhibition, Gabriela Albergaria considers the notion of a connected topological space where any two points can be joined by a path. She creates an artificial garden illustrating an impossible connection—an unreal perspective between two trees that are geographically distant from each other.
The Birdwatchers is curated by Laura Bardier, an independent curator and currently a Manager at the Estrellita B. Brodsky Collection. A regular writer for Domus Magazine and Arte al Dia International, she holds an MFA in New Media from the Donau University. Her recent exhibitions include “Richard Garet – Espacios No-Euclídeos” at the Espacio Arte Contemporáneo, Montevideo, Uruguay. Forthcoming projects include the touring exhibition “Los impolíticos” previously shown at Palazzo delle Arti Napoli, Italia.
Biography
Gabriela Albergaria uses gardens as the main material of her work. She uses them as a tool that is simultaneously narrative, aesthetic, anthropological and mnemonic to produce photography, drawings, installations, and sculptures. These social and collective references intercross with personal and subjective memoirs of her intimate experiences. Albergaria has exhibited at Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo, Brazil; Galeria Vera Cortês, Lisbon, Portugal; Galeria Vermelho, Sao Paulo, Brazil; Kunsthalle Emden, Emden, Germany; and Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver, Canada; among others. She studied at the Fine Arts University of Porto in Portugal and held artist residences at the University of Oxford Botanic Garden in collaboration with the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art and at Kunstlerhaus Bethanien in Berlin, Germany. She lives and works in Lisbon, Berlin and New York.
The exhibition will run from December 8, 2011 to January 21, 2001.
Bitforms Gallery, 529 West 20th St # 2, NYC
Gallery Hours: Tue – Sat, 11:00 AM – 6:00 PM