Monograph 'Lara Almarcegui. Projects 1995–2010', published by Archive Books and edited by Latitudes

Editor: Latitudes
Publisher & Design: Archive Books, Berlin
Texts: Cuauhtémoc Medina, Lars Bang Larsen and Latitudes
Specs: 224 pages, colour, 21 x 27.5 cm. Black-and-white and colour illustrations. Flexicover, English.
ISBN: 978-88-95702-05-6

Published by Berlin-based Archive Books, 'Lara Almarcegui. Projects 1995–2010' is the first monograph presenting an overview of the last fifteen years of Almarcegui's artistic practice.

The main part of the publication is formed by detailed documentation of the artist’s works and publications companioned by new descriptive texts written by the editors. These are presented in the following sections: ‘Demolition’, ‘Excavation’, ‘Construction materials’, ‘Ruins’, ‘Wastelands’ (survey, access, and preservation).

Alongside an introductory essay by the editors of the publication, art critic, curator and art historian Cuauhtémoc Medina and the theorist and curator Lars Bang Larsen contribute texts. Medina presents a revised and updated version of a previously unpublished essay entitled ‘The beauty of open space: Lara Almarcegui and the freedom of the unplanned’. The essay involves an analysis of the ‘aesthetic tautology’ of the 17th-century English garden – ‘a field turned into a garden which is made to seem like a field’ – and develops a context for Almarcegui’s work through a partial history of man’s ‘perfection’ of nature, and more especially the concept of nature as coincidental with the origin of industrial modernity.

Lars Bang Larsen offers an interpretation of a single work from the artist’s ‘Construction materials’ series: 'Construction materials, City of São Paulo' (2006). Based on a talk given by the author at the Creative Time Summit: Revolutions in Public Space, New York, October 2009, Bang Larsen argues that “Almarcegui’s work equips us with the hubris to reconceive of the city and evaluate and re-organise it as a social space” (+ info...)

The publication has been possible thanks to the Fonds BKVB (Netherlands Foundation for Visual Arts, Design and Architecture).

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Lara Almarcegui (1972, Zaragoza. Lives and works in Rotterdam, the Netherlands) has had solo shows at Künstlerhaus Bremen, Bremen (2011); Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporáneo, Sevilla (2011); TENT, Rotterdam (2011); Secession, Vienna (2010); Ludlow 38, New York (2010); the Centro Arte Contemporaneo, Málaga (2007), FRAC Bourgogne, Dijon (2004) and at INDEX, Stockholm (2003). She participated in group exhibitions such as Radical Nature – Art & Architecture for a Changing Planet 1969-2009, Barbican, London (2009); Taipei Art Biennial, Taiwan (2008); Estratos, Murcia (2008); Sharjah Art Biennial 8, Sharjah (2007); 27th São Paulo Bienal, São Paulo (2006); Frieze Art Fair Projects, London (2006) and the Liverpool Biennial (2004). In 2008 she presented the guidebook 'Ruins in the Netherlands XIX-XXI' published by Episode. Almarcegui studied Fine Arts in Cuenca (1991–95) and at the Ateliers 63, Amsterdam (1996–98). She has recently been awarded the Dolf Henkes Prize, Rotterdam (2011). In 2012 Almarcegui will have solo shows at the Centro de Arte Dos de Mayo, Móstoles and the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y León (MUSAC).