SANDRO PORCU / PER MIO PADRE / June 27 – August 2, 2008

exhibition views (please click on the image to enlarge):

(Photos: Uwe Walter)

Sandro Porcu is a restless seeker, disclosing subtly the wounds of our society. To create his sculptures, he often goes days and nights through the streets to find the right subject, the appropriate physiognomy – a hand, a face or even an entire person. From these – alienated, enlarged, cast in plaster or molded in wax – he produces hyper-realistic artworks. Sometimes integrated mechanics enliven the sculptures. The mechanics increase the already deceptively real physical presence of Porcu's works so that the visitor of his exhibitions must look several times before discovering the illusion.

At first glance Sandro Porcu's sculptures resemble well-known works by Maurizio Cattelan or Robert Gober. But by using kinetic functionality, Porcu creates an additional „experience-level“ that reinforces the already direct disclosure of the reality of everyday life.

In one of his works, Sandro Porcu shows an old man sitting on a suitcase who is apparently very tired. Again and again he dozes off. But his nap is very short. As soon as the old man has fallen asleep, he straightens up again. He seems to be tired of the day or even of his life, fighting not only against the sleep. To speak in terms of Cicero: „somnus imago mortis“ („the sleep is the image of death“).

In his work „TAKES“, Sandro Porcu presents a larger-than-life arm wrapped in white linen rising from the ceiling. The hand has the typical attitude of the traditional gesture of dextra dei – in a way of taking as well as giving. Porcu evokes various associations, among them Michelangelo's representation of the „Awakening of Adam“ in the Sistine Chapel.

The themes of Sandro Porcu's solo exhibition „PER MIO PADRE“ revolve around the dialectics of this world and beyond, of idealism and materialism – in time and space.

(Text by Annette Doms, May 2008)

Opening documented by the Berlin Artcontacter:
www.berlinerkunstkontakter.de