Naufus Ramírez-Figueroa: Two Flamingos Copulating on a Tin Roof

The Krefelder Kunstmuseen is pleased to announce the exhibition Two Flamingos Copulating on a Tin Roof by the 16th recipient of the Mies van der Rohe Award, Naufus Ramírez-Figueroa (*1978 in Guatemala City, currently lives and works in Berlin). For his first institutional solo show in Germany, Ramírez-Figueroa has created new works specifically for Haus Esters. According Katia Baudin, Director of the Kunstmuseen Krefeld, “we are very pleased that for the first time, the Mies van der Rohe Award has been given to a promising young artist from Latin America. Naufus Ramírez-Figueroa brings a new perspective to the rich tradition of site specific installations that has been a longstanding hallmark of the museum’s exhibition policy in two modernist villas by Mies van der Rohe, Haus Lange and Haus Esters.”

Naufus Ramírez-Figueroa does not approach Mies van der Rohe’s villa with a view to the history of architecture but subjectively instead, transforming it into a dreamlike functional space recalling a domestic patient care situation. He comprehends the rooms in the former residential structure as an emotionally defined place that not only awakens his own personal biographical memories of living in Canada as a political refugee from Guatemala but also gives rise to fictional narratives that emerge from between the villa’s walls.                                                             His sculptures, which are often made out of simple materials such as styrofoam, metal and glass, are arranged in the space like scurrilous props, immersing the viewer with all his senses in a pink and light blue colored scenario featuring medical-like furnishings, deformed flamingos and the mutations of varied natural phenomena. They tell the stories of cult objects related to traditional folkloristic medicine as well as utensils from contemporary patient care and everyday domestic life. Ramírez-Figueroa stages Haus Esters with these items as an ideal location for convalescence processes and physical treatments. Such associations are provoked in particular by Mies van der Rohe’s special material language as well as his open translucent spatial concept with its connection to the nature surrounding the villa.                                                        

In Two Flamingos Copulating on a Tin Roof, Ramírez-Figueroa offers a commentary on the taming of nature and the body in society. As an artist with a transnational background, his artistic practice is characterized by a very personal occupation with such crucial themes as identity, the body, and cultural as well as architectural history. In the process, he employs practices of Latin American folklore, mythology, and magic while questioning the properties of a universal, globalized high culture. His installations formulate a very personal stage-like narrative.

Endowed with 5,000 EUR, the Mies van der Rohe Award of the City of Krefeld was established in 1979 with the purpose of supporting and promoting promising young artists. Thanks to the Award, now internationally renowned artists such as Juan Muñoz, Stan Douglas, and Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster had their first exhibition in Germany here. The proposal committee for this year’s Award was made up by Jessica Morgan (Dia Art Foundation, New York), Laurence Sillars (Baltic Center for Contemporary Art, Gateshead), and Nicolaus Schafhausen (Kunsthalle Wien). In a second step, the jury members Katia Baudin (Kunstmuseen Krefeld), Bart de Baere (Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst, Antwerp), Helen Hirsch (Kunstmuseum Thun), Dr. Sylvia Martin (Kunstmuseen Krefeld), and Holger Otten (Ludwig Forum, Aachen) selected the winner.

Guest curator: Dorothee Mosters

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