Experimental Station. Research and Artistic Phenomena
14 May–9 October 2011
Opening:
Friday, 13 May 8 pm
CA2M Centro de Arte Dos de Mayo
Madrid, Spain
www.ca2m.org
Experimental Station is a co-production with LABoral Centro de Arte y Creación Industrial, Gijón, Spain
www.laboralcentrodearte.org
Julio Adán, Guillem Bayo, Alberto Baraya, Luis Bisbe, Ingrid Buchwald, Carlos Bunga, Caleb Charland, David Clarkson, Björn Dahlem, Karlos Gil, Faivovich & Goldberg, O Grivo, João Maria Gusmão and Pedro Paiva, Lyn Hagan, Ilana Halperin, Kiluanji Kia Henda, Esther Mañas and Arash Moori, Milton Marques, Alistair McClymont, Rivane Neuenschwander and Cao Guimarães, Jorge Peris, Paloma Polo, Rubén Ramos Balsa, Conrad Shawcross, Ariel Schlesinger, Alberto Tadiello, Jan Tichy, Ben Woodeson and Raphaël Zarka.
Curators:
Andrés Mengs and Virginia Torrente
Experimental Station is an exhibition that explores the crossroads and overlaps of art and science, finding connections between the implausible or, at the very least, the improbable.
The exhibition features the work of 29 artists whose artistic practices share a fair number of motivations, quests and impossible horizons with scientific research. Formal research, pseudo-science, science fiction and paranormal phenomena are the experimental domains in which they are focused and through which they materialize their work.
Both artistic and scientific devices lead us to places of change and discovery, whether it is with a real or imaginary purpose. We are referring to creation as a location for experimentation, and in this respect, science and art partake of a common aspiration: to conduct researches that question our current knowledge, to look for a new frontier.
Science and art are also connected by keen interests. Ethics and aesthetics are concepts that invite both the artist and the scientist to think and reflect. Scientists work in a brilliant space of observation, supported by knowledge and thorough procedures, in order to get and gather data; artists get in this restricted area through a parallel entrance. Throughout history, a large amount of ideas investigated has led to breakthroughs but also to impasses: Utopias and failures, a commonplace of art and science.
There is a long way between formulas, experiments and results, and many possibilities in the process of trial and error. Chance and probability are two accurate words to describe what happens during this quest, whether systematically or erratically.
As John Cage stated: “Art is a sort of experimental station.”
On the occasion of the exhibition, a bilingual catalogue (English-Spanish) will be published including an essay by Pablo Martín Pascual.
CA2M Opening hours:
Tuesday – Sunday 11:00–21:00 hrs.
www.ca2m.org
