02_Aranberri Cast

Ibon Aranberri PARTIAL VIEW

Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid

With texts by: Ruth Noack, Shep Steiner & Miren Jaio

PARTIAL VIEW ENTRESAKA

Ibon Aranberri

PARTIAL VIEW

Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía,

Madrid

ENTRESAKA

Museum of Contemporary Art of the Basque Country, Artium Museoa, Vitoria-Gasteiz

With texts by: Ruth Noack, Shep Steiner & Miren Jaio

BREAKDOWN

pp. 6–224

ALBUM

Plates 1–64

TEXTS

RUTH NOACK

SPENDING TIME IN PARTIAL VIEW

pp. I–XII

SHEP STEINER

SNOW CHANGES EVERYTHING

pp. XIII–XXIV

MIREN JAIO

DI FRONTE E ATTRAVERSO

pp. XXV–XL

p. 9 – Contraplan, 1996

p. 13 – Disorder, 2007

BREAKDOWN

p. 17 – Mapa interrumpido, 2000–2004

p. 31 – Mirando a Madrid desde la distancia, 2000–2024

p. 33 – Protopaisaje (working title), 2003

p. 39 – Zulo beltzen geometria, 2019

p. 45 – Inverted Schemes, 2003

p. 49 – S/T (Detour), 2011

p. 51 – Mar del Pirineo, 2006

p. 57 – PLACED SOMEPLACE WITH INTENT / ASMOZ NONBAIT JARRIA, 2014

p. 58 – Pronóstico meteorológico de Madrid del 10/04/2014 al 06/06/2014 escrito en euskera, 2014

p. 65 – Barrutik kanpora, 2019

p. 71 – Macrosistema, 2011

p. 73 – Política hidráulica, 2004–10

p. 81 – Exercises on the North Side, 2007

p. 89 – Untitled, 1996

– Positions (working title), 1996

p. 93 – Cavity, 2005

p. 97 – S/T (San Pellegrino), 2016

p. 99 – Firestone, 1997

p. 103 – Home & Country, 2018

– Basauri, 1998

p. 107 – Dam Dreams, 2004

p. 111 – S/T (Territoire), 1997–2024

p. 115 – Transakzio denbora, 2003

– S/T (Taula), 2003

– S/T (Retratos), 2003

p. 121 – S/T (Blackout), 2003

p. 127 – Untitled, 2005

p. 129 – Piedra e intersección, 1994

p. 131 – Itzal marra, 2019

p. 139 – Modelos y constructos, 2014

p. 143 – Obstáculos para la renovación, 2010–22

p. 149 – …

p. 151 – Almanaque, 2022

p. 157 – Compendium, 2022

p. 161 – Operatori, 2021–ongoing

p. 171 – Makina eskua da, 2016

p. 181 – Sources Without Qualities (2), 2017

p. 185 – Dana, 1994

– Laranjak, 1994

p. 189 – Gramática de meseta, 2010

p. 195 – Organigrama, 2010–11

p. 203 – Despoblación (working title), 2010

p. 209 – Apariencia tridimensional, 2013

p. 213 – Modulaciones, 1998

p. 217 – Untitled, 2010

p. 221 – Gaur Egun (This is CNN), 2002

Contraplan (Counterplan), 1996

Single-channel video on three monitors placed on three medium-height stands with a perimeter matching that of the monitors, and a gap of approximately 50 cm between them

Color, no sound, Betacam SP

Duration (in loop):

– Video 1: 9 min.

– Video 2: 7:25 min.

– Video 3: 11 min.

In the first recording, a video camera has captured the recurring shape of the forestry plantations from a distance. The tracking shot was repeated several times through the window of the bus traveling along the northern highway. These images are accompanied by footage of other camera movements—panning and zoom in and out—capturing the same plantations from different angles.

The retrieval, editing, and playback of this footage attempts to merge the repeated image of the jagged outline, creating a constant movement: a continuity of views and looped sequences divided across three monitors.

The texture of the camera used in television news bulletins reflects the kinds of images produced at the time. They are typical of professional media prior to digital technology. With twentieth-century industrialization, the Pinus radiata species gradually replaced the native forest. This artificial transformation of the environment gradually darkened the tonal range of the horizon.

This exercise carried out through the camera aimed to recreated the generic archetype that will replace the image of a depleted ancestral landscape. After several years, the obsolescence of a disused medium meets the vision of a landscape in decline. At the same time, forest species have been getting sick as their ecosystem deteriorates as a result of successive monoculture farming, without the power to resist new global pandemics.

Disorder, 2007

Spruce wood and wood stain

Measurements of each board: 14 × 2 × 481 cm

Dimensions: 481 × 265 cm

The timber-slatted surface was conceived by the museum curators as a way to present archival material from various projects in the artist’s solo exhibition. Timber commonly used in DIY projects was stained in a dark color to match the floor of the exhibition hall, which has a late nineteenth-century hardwood finish.

It was originally intended as a raised horizontal platform on four trestles. This idea was discarded when the rest of the works resolved the exhibition on their own. However, a decision was made to keep it in the room as a freestanding material element, devoid of content, juxtaposed to the floor, without the trestles.

In the next exhibition, this surface was displayed as an autonomous form, in a vertical position leaning on the wall to emphasize its status. On subsequent occasions it was placed in various positions, adapting to the different architectural characteristics.

On each occasion, the surface is assembled from the boards with tongueand-groove joints. The handling of the timber during the assembly and dismantling of the surface leads to erosion and creates marks that remain visible, as consequences of its own past. After being in storage for several years, the boards have been reassembled to create the full surface, repeating the same exercise in the museum space.

Exhibited in:

1. Integration, Kunsthalle Basel, 2007

2. Disorder, Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt am Main, 2008

3. Organogramme, Fundació Antoni Tàpies, Barcelona, 2011

4. Partial View, Museo Reina Sofía, Madrid, 2023

5. Entresaka, Artium Museoa, Vitoria-Gasteiz, 2024

Mapa interrumpido (Interrupted Map), 2000–2004

Projection of 80 35mm slides

4 printed sheets, A4 format

Orographic map. India ink on onion paper, A3 format

90 screen-printed T-shirts

Project to Turn the Lemoniz Nuclear Power Plant and the Affected Lands into a Space for Public Use, 1998

Carmen Abad Ibáñez de Matauco, architect

Private collection

Untitled, 2007

Paper, cardboard, wood construction

Dimensions: 140 × 130 × 123 cm

Courtesy of the artist

Atlántida (Atlantis). Project for a Science Museum for Lemoniz Nuclear Power Plant, 2001–02

Néstor Basterretxea

Paper and cardboard construction

Museum of Contemporary Art of the Basque Country, Artium Museoa, Vitoria-Gasteiz

Banner. Printing on canvas

Measurements: 80 × 75 × 4 cm (collected)

Invited by consonni, a center for contemporary artistic practices, Ibon Aranberri’s project focused on the urban space of Bilbao, attuned to the work of other artists who had participated in this initiative since its launch in 1996. The period he was researching coincided with the changes associated with the 1997 opening of the Guggenheim Museum that substantially transformed ways of living in and understanding the city. The proposal involved revisiting the archetype of the contemporary city, taking the anachronistic setting of the Lemoniz nuclear power plant as a line of flight.

Located on the coast of Bizkaia, twenty kilometers as the crow flies from the city center, the nuclear power plant—which was never switched on—forms part of the industrial and social landscape that transformed the region in the second half of the twentieth century. Its construction—in line with a developmentalist economic model committed to industrial growth, increasingly dependent on energy supply—sparked strong opposition, giving rise to a social and cultural movement against the nuclear plan and in favor of protecting the environment and the identity of the region. In addition, the actions of ETA, with a campaign of harassment and deadly attacks against the plant, and the start of the transition period strengthened the political decision to declare a moratorium on the proposed nuclear projects. The plan came to a standstill in 1984, but the infrastructure—neglected and half-forgotten on the map— maintained a palpable emotional and symbolic weight.

The year 2000 came at a time of relaxation and optimism that seemed to offer the right conditions for revisiting this scenario with a certain critical distance.

It also offered the opportunity to implement elements of collective analysis and social participation. In this spirit, the idea was to revisit the physical site of the power plant as well as the enduring imaginary associated with it, through present-day points of view and forms of mediation such as drawing figurative maps, moving bodies in response to past events, a fireworks choreography designed for the site, visual reinterpretations of the iconography of the past, and graphic documentation (both reissued and specifically generated).

Three years after the official opening of the Guggenheim, the juxtaposition of the site, the industrial ruin, and the social mass was intended—the artist said—as a form of reparation and learning that drew on complex and traumatic elements. The proposal was suspended due to certain circumstances, but over time the images that had been created and the archives that had emerged during the process took on a meaning of their own. After several attempts, a projection of eighty slides in the form of a dynamic loop was completed. Thus, this visual narrative is presented in a different order each time.

Near the projection in the exhibition space, there is a heap of T-shirts originally intended to be offered to visitors. They had been stored in boxes without ever being used. They altered and combined commercial iconographies and graphics from the social opposition movement, emulating the concentration of a social mass in the open landscape that, once it ceased, never came to pass.

The content and appearance of this installation has been modified the few times it has been shown in public. It has also taken on a different title with each new staging, in a progressive revision of its narrative. On this occasion it is temporarily accompanied by three borrowed scale models, produced by different people, that propose interpretations and future uses of the Lemoniz nuclear power plant. They represent projects for the recovery and reuse of the infrastructure, which from to time to time are proposed but fail to crystallize. The models of these three projects have been sculpturally modified by Ibon Aranberri in various ways with the use of successive layers and additional perspectives.

Project to Turn the Lemoniz Nuclear Power Plant and the Affected Lands into a Space for Public Use

Carmen Abad Ibáñez de Matauco, 1998

These models are part of the 1998 final course project “Project to Turn the Lemoniz Nuclear Power Plant and the Affected Lands into a Space for Public Use,” as a basis for the development of a heritage park. Given that the models accompanied the development process, they are essentially working models. The project consists of two phases: Selective Destruction and Transformation. Models 3 and 4 can be dismantled to show the evolution of the building in the two phases of the project.

Working MODEL 1

Setting of the site on the coastal strip between Armintza and Bakio

Scale: 1:10,000. Dimensions: 70 × 37 × 10 cm

Materials: cork, cardboard, wood

Made by Carmen and José Luis Abad

Working MODEL 3 (dismountable)

Main building: when fully assembled, the model represents the site in its current state. The removal of the pieces simulates the destruction, which is the first phase of the project. The model then becomes the ruins of the building, forming part of the landscape. On these ruins, the second phase of the project is carried out: the transformation of the administration building into a square, of the control building into a bridge building, of the north and south units into centrifugal containment and centripetal containment buildings, of the auxiliary buildings into labyrinths, of the turbine building into a sea island, etc.

Scale: 1:800. Dimensions: 62 × 45 × 15 cm

Materials: cork, cardboard, balsa wood, card stock

Made by Carmen Abad

Working MODEL 2

Location of the site turned into a park and of the platform, which is the location of the Main Building, turned into a garden

Scale: 1:2,000. Dimensions: 86 × 72 × 15 cm

Materials: cork, cardboard, wood

Made by Carmen and José Luis Abad

Working MODEL 4 (dismountable)

South containment building: when fully assembled, the model represents the site in its current state. The removal of the pieces simulates selective destruction, which is the first phase of the project (4 pieces). The second phase of the project is its transformation into a centripetal containment building.

Scale: 1:250. Dimensions: 26 × 26 × 36 cm

Materials: wood pulp, recycled packaging, balsa wood

Made by Carmen and José Luis Abad

Working MODEL 5

Section of the three walls of the southern part of the control building turned into the bridge building

Scale: 1:250. Dimensions: 20 × 6 × 6 cm

Materials: balsa wood

Made by Carmen Abad

Working MODEL 6

Section of the north auxiliary building turned into a labyrinth

Scale: 1:100. Dimensions: 46 × 33 × 12 cm

Materials: balsa wood, wire mesh, paper

Made by Carmen Abad

Untitled, 2007

Paper, cardboard, and wood construction

Dimensions: 129 × 122 × 70 cm

Courtesy of the artist

This model, not created by anyone in particular, is a scaled-down representation of the nuclear power plant site as it would have looked once the work was completed, in the late 1970s. Interpreted in general terms based on existing models and plans, it shows the external appearance of the completed infrastructure, located in the bay that had previously been filled by earthworks.

Over time, the industrial components of the power plant have degraded, some elements have been dismantled, and plant life has taken over the open spaces. Despite occasional media announcements about new projects and various interests, the reality of the existing scene still prevails, as a trace of its own past. The materiality of the ruin persists in time, as a surface on which speculations are marked out.

The nuclear power plant site, unoccupied for decades, has generated its own image. In this sense, it has consolidated itself as a possible setting that reveals its memory and determines future hypotheses. The blue plexiglass casing placed upside down over the model posits a reversible alternative between the transparency and opacity of a saturated sky, generating a dual effect, part idyllic nature and part dystopian fiction.

Atlántida (Atlantis): Project for a Science Museum for the Lemoniz Nuclear Power Plant, 2001–02

Néstor Basterretxea

Paper and cardboard construction

Dimensions: 172 × 74 × 44 cm

Museum of Contemporary Art of the Basque Country, Artium Museoa, Vitoria-Gasteiz

This model, created as a promotional image by Basque artist Néstor Basterretxea, was the first materialization of the project commissioned by the provincial council in collaboration with the university.

The Atlántida project proposed turning the structure of the nuclear power plant into a thematic park, and implementing it as a city of energy, science, technology, and the environment. The design was expressed in sketches first, and then in geometric volumes showing the architecture transformed into a sculptural concept. An enclosure was to cover the entire nuclear power plant structure, with a façade of approximately 54,000 m2 of white stone, glass, and stainless steel.

According to the proposed plan, Ciudad de Atlántida (City of Atlantis) would revolve around the emblematic building, with energy as the unifying thread and the nuclear power plant as the main element, and with a science and technology museum, an educational and training center, a theme and leisure park, astronomy and hospitality, a science park, a business incubator, an environmental center and space set aside for energy generation.

Mirando a Madrid desde la distancia (Looking at Madrid from a Distance), 2000–2024

72 framed 35mm slides, on a light box

This slide captures the moment of an improvised journey to the outskirts of Madrid, in response to an invitation to present projects in the context of the city’s public space.

The image reproduced here shows the artist in the shade of several trees, looking at the horizon through binoculars. Based on the direction he is facing, we deduce that he can see the city skyline in the distance. This movement can be interpreted as taking up a particular position in relation to the city. The fact that he is on the outskirts and looking from a distance suggests an ambivalent relation with the metropolis, perhaps as a result of misapprehensions and conflicting emotions.

The fragile slide—which has survived as one of a few existing images—has been stabilized and reproduced in order to update it as a pretext seeking to change its nature, shedding its original status as document.

The seventy-two copies of the same slide cover the surface of a light box, recreated here in its new role as a lamp that stands out in the exhibition. The light box, with the slides mounted on its external surface, generates an abstracted scene that becomes a focus within the museum space. The material fragility of these images—which will gradually fade as a result of prolonged contact with the light of the box—is in line with the transience of an action barely represented in time.

Over the course of several decades, the city’s inexorable sprawl swallowed up the site where the photograph was taken, and today it is no longer possible to identify the actual place.

Protopaisaje (Protolandscape, working title), 2003

Five analog photographs, b/w, gelatin silver prints on baryta paper Dimensions: 73 × 94 cm (each)

Photographs taken with no specific purpose by artist Ignacio Sáez while exploring inside the prehistoric cave. A printed map was handed out in advance, with the notice and instructions for walking to the site. The blanket of snow that had fallen the day before changed the perception of the landscape, causing participants to pay notable attention to the surrounding nature. The black-and-white photographs capture a timeless, almost archaic scene, in which the dark figures against the white backdrop mimic the chiaroscuro of the vegetation, the rocky hollow, and the stream flowing past it. The negatives taken on that excursion have been enlarged for the first time, and the views have been placed in a vertical sequence on the walls of the museum.

Zulo beltzen geometria (Geometry of the Black Holes), 2019

Cataphoresis-treated steel, galvanized steel, and wood

21 modules (11 units of 100 × 175 × 5 cm, 10 units of variable sizes)

4 galvanized steel beams:

10 × 610.5 × 10 cm

10 × 597 × 10 cm

10 × 500 × 10 cm

10 × 296 × 10 cm

26 wooden slats: 3 × 104 × 9 cm (each)

34 wooden blocks: 3 × 9 × 9 cm (each)

Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao. Acquired in 2019

The metal sheets stand out against the granite floor. They are spaced apart and scattered over the surface of the exhibition hall. In a previous version they were stacked together in two blocks, arranged as they would be for commercial supply.

Some of the elements (half) are whole rectangular modules of the same size. Others have one or two irregular sides, with the metal surface outlining the relief of the rock—a different pattern in each case. One of the whole modules has a circular opening in the center, its diameter spanning almost the entire width of the surface. In another, integrated hinges and a lock protrude from the inside. All the modules in the room rest on wooden slats and rectangularsection blocks that lift them slightly off the floor.

Some parts show the wear and tear of the passing of time, with rusty corners and slight distortions of the surface. The matte, opaque black is covered by a whitish layer, which results from the lime deposits caused by rainwater running down the surface after falling through the limestone of the promontory where the cave is located.

There are also four square-section galvanized beams of different lengths, placed parallel to each other. Their ends are cut and capped at different angles, according to the slant of the rock at the point of contact, with a groove in which to embed the nuts of the eight threaded rods inserted into the walls, which held up the whole assemblage.

These modules and beams formed part of the structure that sealed the entrance of a prehistoric cave for almost two decades. The closing structure was dismantled when circumstances changed over time, returning the cave to its original state.

There is no rational explanation for the action of closing a cave. It was the consequence of an inner search, when the artist had temporarily distanced himself from the city where he had made his previous works. The rapid transformation of cities in the postindustrial era seemed to open up opportunities to expand artistic projects. However, the limitation of these aspirations soon became clear, with the tendency for ideas to be subjected to consensus and faced with the regulated and increasingly restrictive uses of public space.

…

The determination to probe, measure, and physically disrupt the status of the caves can be understood as an attempt to find a counterpoint to technical and social codes in the natural environment. After studying the various existing regulations and taking advantage of bureaucratic gaps, the closure of the cave was negotiated with the authorities. As a result, one of the caves that had been explored was made inaccessible. It was closed off to humans without obstructing the habitat inside. At the same time, the terrain could not be altered due to the heritage value of the subsoil. These parameters determined the technical aspects of the structure closing off the entrance. The blackened steel surface separated the inside from outside, connecting them by means of a hole cut into the sheet, allowing bats to fly in and out. A margin around the perimeter ensured temperature and humidity levels remained the same.

Almost two decades after that action, and contrary to the original discourse, the entire structure that sealed the cave was removed, returning it to its original state. The dismantled materials were gathered up for display in disassembled form. The result has been exhibited in various settings, uncoupled from its original function. The title and the time of this work pertain to that second action. It is displayed in the museum gallery without references that could help us understand its intra-history.

The original process of closing off a prehistoric cave also generated other images, some of which can be found in this exhibition (drawings of sleeping bats, a video recorded inside the sealed cave before returning it to its original state, a series of photographs taken by artist Ignacio Sáez on an excursion through the snow to the interior of the cave days before it was closed off, etc.).

Inverted Schemes, 2003

Graphite pencil on paper

21 drawings

Dimensions: 210 × 297 mm (each)

The dark mass of the sleeping bat reveals a vague shape, different each time. It is like a body with no fixed anatomy; it could be a solid extension of the rock supporting it.

These drawings were made as automatic memory sketches after visiting the interior of numerous caves—which are abundant in the region—following the information on the archaeological maps. The expedition was carried out in the old-fashioned way, with the artist in the role of solitary naturalist, deliberately dispensing with means of representation. No photographic cameras or image-capturing devices were used, ensuring at every turn a purely contemplative journey.

The pencil lines with no clearly defined style are now a retrospective trace of an unrecorded gaze. So we could also read the sleeping bodies of the bats as a small extrapolation of the rocky formation of the interior of the caves.

Some time later, one of the caves explored during this expedition was, after obtaining the necessary permits, deliberately closed off. Years later, the materials used for this action were removed and used to create Zulo beltzen geometria (Geometry of the Black Holes, 2019), the work that shares the space with the drawings in the museum gallery. Spatially attached to one of the corners of the room, the drawings are shown together as a group for the first time: a personal testimony of that transformative quest.

S/T (Detour), 2011

Diameter 185 cm

Mar del Pirineo (Sea of the Pyrenees), 2006

Media: polyester resin and fiberglass

Dimensions: 6 modules, 244 × 122 × 35 cm (each)

Additional elements: photographic prints, log sections, etc. Colección Fundación Valentín de Madariaga y Oya-MP

This work is a three-dimensional scale model of the actual cartography of a valley transformed by the construction of water infrastructure. Its title seems to evoke a strange, fictional place—it sounds like the abstraction of a dual environment that can be both sea and mountain, blue and green. It is a reference to an actual existing site: a recreational complex built around the infrastructure that over time has lost its appeal.

Accurately reproducing the orography of the flooded valley, the six contiguous modules form the unreal place as negative space. The smooth surface of the water looks like a prairie plateau and the hills that rise in the surrounding area become dolines and hollows, like upside-down geographic features.

The synthetic neutral gray material standardizes the orographic variations. The irregularity perceived from the outside suggests a place reminiscent of an anthropological void—an imagined representation based on a model displayed on the wall as if it were a sculptural frieze. The gaps between the modules interrupt the continuity of the abstracted landscape, generating a repeated, specific progression in each case.

Additional information

For his solo exhibition at Parra & Romero gallery in Madrid in 2014, New York artist Lawrence Weiner (1942–2021) prepared a new statement. In keeping with his line of work, he was to graphically adapt the statement to the physical characteristics of the gallery, seeking a precise relationship in his distinctive typeface and using a vector design.

Because of his interest in linguistics, for this adaptation Lawrence Weiner decided to work with the official languages of the Spanish state, expanding the initial idea and de-hierarchizing it in order to collaborate with artists with cultural ties to those languages and a certain affinity with the methods of conceptual art. These artists were Isidoro Valcárcel Medina, working with Spanish, Antoni Muntadas with Catalan, David Lamelas with Galician, and Ibon Aranberri with Basque. Avoiding a purely literal translation of the proposed statement, each artist was asked to appropriate its polysemy and interpret its meaning in accordance with the use of words in Weiner’s practice.

The initial idea was to reproduce Lawrence Weiner’s statement PLACED SOMEPLACE WITH INTENT along with the adaptation in each of the four official languages in four versions, displaying them on each of the four walls of the gallery. The words of the English statement paired with each adaptation were graphically framed with borders the same width as the typeface. Their overlapping right angles intertwined, creating gaps and intersections. Ibon Aranberri formulated the Basque version as ASMOZ NONBAIT JARRIA

In the second part, during the exhibition, each artist added a new formalization, maintaining the idiomatic link through a text-object. Among Basque uses, which are often subject to symbolic prejudice, meteorology seemed to offer an apparently neutral field. An external lockable bulletin board fixed to the wall displayed the daily weather forecast for Madrid. First thing every morning, the glass case was unlocked and the new day’s updated forecast received by email was placed inside. Each new printed A4 sheet covered the previous ones, and was held in place by two magnets pressing against the metal base. They continued to overlap in successive layers until the last day of the exhibition.

The written weather forecasts were based on the variables used by meteorological bureaus, and sought to maintain a plausible expression. The descriptions were open to a contingent reading, given that they were written and presented without translation in a language unintelligible to most citizens of Madrid. At a time when meteorological reporting tends toward recognizable visual codes, this formulation suggested an anachronistic narrative, which today’s means would lead us to describe as perhaps more poetic than scientific writing.

In this exhibition, the two elements of Aranberri’s contribution to Lawrence Weiner’s work have been brought together again, removed from their original context. As such, they have been added to the list of works in the exhibition at the museum, with their own title and technical specifications. On the one hand, Placed Someplace with Intent / Asmoz nonbait jarria is listed as a work consisting of cut vinyl wall lettering, reproduced from the recovered file, and attributed to Lawrence Weiner. On the other, Pronóstico meteorológico de Madrid del 10/04/2014 al 06/06/2014 escrito en euskera (Madrid Weather Forecast from 4/10/2014 to 6/6/2014 Written in Basque) is listed as a lockable bulletin board containing all the forecasts, and attributed to Ibon Aranberri.

However, both elements—the glass bulletin board with the sheets of paper and the rolled-up vinyl lettering—have been placed on a shelf, away from the wall of the corridor where they were to have been displayed. Legal issues concerning ownership following the death of Lawrence Weiner and the museum’s code of ethics regarding the global geopolitical situation during the exhibition were a deterrent to the lettering and the bulletin board being displayed together, as intended. Thus, the wall remains empty, with the museum lighting maintained as planned. A sheet of paper with a draft of the text for the wall label, provisionally stuck to the wall with some masking tape, is the only reference to the idea.

Información cartela A:

Pronóstico meteorológico de Madrid del 10/04/2014 al 06/06/2014 escrito en euskera, 2014 (Madrid Weather Forecast f rom 4 4/10/2014 to 6/6/2014 Written in Basque)

Vitrina de pared de aluminio y vidrio, de medida 29 × 37 × 3 c cm, 37 impresiones de tinta sobre papel DINA4, imanes.

Aluminum and glass wall display case, measuring. 29 × 37 × 3 c cm, 37 ink prints on DINA4 paper, magnets.

PARED 1.4.4.

Información cartela B:

PLACED SOMEPLACE WITH INTENT / ASMOZ NONBAIT JARRIA, 2014

Vinilo de corte

304 × 53 cm

Cut vinyl

304 × 53 cm

Lawrence Weiner en colaboración con Ibon Aranberri

Lawrence Weiner in collaboration with Ibon Aranberri

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Apirilak23,asteazkena, Eurigiroamendialdean

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Tenperaturadidagokionez,aldaketahandirikez,beherakojoeran,7ºCeta19ºC bitartean.Hego-mendebaldetikjokoduhaizeak,18km/oabiaduraz,tarteka astinaldiakeraginez.

Apirilak24,asteazkena

Euriasarrietaekaitzatarteka

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Apirilak25,ostirala

Eguzkia,etalainorenbat

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Apirilak26,larunbata Lainoaldietazaparrada

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Barrutik kanpora (Inside Out), 2019

Single-channel digital video projection, 13 min.

In the images filmed in the dark interior of the cave at dusk and dawn, there is a hole in a flat black surface. Due to the contrast with the light outside, it resembles a vision of a full moon. When the camera lens is focused on the background of the scene, the branches of the trees outside can be seen, moving in the wind.

Every now and then, the erratic flight of bats is silhouetted against the light, entering and leaving in the semidarkness through the hole cut from the opaque surface. When the movement stops and the camera lens is pointed at the emptiness of the hole, it tends to lose focus due to the bats flying in and out, confusing the autofocus sensor.

Previously, the panning of the camera had captured in chiaroscuro the uneven surfaces inside the cave, revealing markings, inscriptions, and graffiti. Several views of the exterior complete the sequence. The flowing stream was filmed at dusk. It is probably where the rainwater seepage ends up after percolating through the limestone. At the beginning of the video, the image of an ancient leafy tree dominates the scene in the dim light. The camera zooms in and frames the hollowed-out trunk, which can be seen through. Throughout the video, the intermittent sound of drops of water can be heard hitting the puddle on the floor of the cave—created by the erosion caused by the water itself—which at a certain point merges with the sound of the stream.

The video has been edited as a series of shots filmed outside and inside the closed-off cave. Years later, the structure that had blocked the entrance to the cave for almost two decades was dismantled, and the site was returned to its natural state prior to the closure. It is present in several of the works in the exhibition.

Macrosistema (Macrosystem), 2011

Two prints on canvas

Dimensions: 121 × 78.5 cm (each)

Política hidráulica (Water Policy), 2004–10

98 framed photographs

49.5 × 61.5 × 3 cm; 49.5 × 61.5 × 3 cm; 49.5 × 61.5 × 3 cm: 49.5 × 61.5 × 3 cm; 48.5 × 60 × 3 cm; 149 × 181 × 2.5 cm; 49.5 × 61.5 × 3 cm; 44 × 63 × 4 cm; 49.5 × 61.5 × 3 cm; 62 × 76 × 3.5 cm; 68 × 70 × 3 cm; 58 × 87 × 3.5 cm; 67.5 × 79 × 2 cm; 66 × 82 × 4 cm; 60 × 90.5 × 3.5 cm; 63 × 83 × 4.5 cm; 71 × 85 × 3.5 cm; 80.5 × 80.5 × 2.5 cm; 76 × 90 × 2 cm; 73 × 87.5 × 4 cm; 73 × 92.5 × 3.5 cm; 78 × 97.5 × 3 cm; 95 × 78 × 4 cm; 82.5 × 98 × 4 cm; 98 × 98 × 3.5 cm; 92 × 102.5 × 4.5 cm; 84 × 103.5 × 4.5 cm; 87 × 111 × 4 cm; 93 × 111 × 3.5 cm; 105 × 126.5 × 2 cm; 107 × 132.5 ×× 4 cm; 57 × 67 × 4 cm; 57 × 67 × 4 cm; 51.5 × 64 × 4 cm; 104 × 132.5 × 4 cm; 104 × 128 × 4.5 cm; 103 × 128 × 4.5 cm; 105 × 126.6 × 2 cm; 107.5 × 128 × 4 cm; 110 × 132.5 × 3 cm; 107.5 × 127.5 × 4 cm; 106 × 133 × 3 cm; 104 × 134.5 × 4 cm; 113 × 133 × 4.5 cm; 64 × 75 × 2 cm; 88 × 113 × 2.5 cm; 93 × 125.5 × 3.5 cm; 128 × 107.5 × 4 cm; 105.5 × 127 × 2 cm; 85.5 × 103.5 × 3 cm; 88 × 133 × 3.5 cm; 105 × 126.5 × 2 cm; 101.5 × 123.5 × 3 cm; 108.5 × 123 × 5 cm; 106 × 135 × 4.5 cm; 92 × 127 × 5 cm; 103 × 122 × 6 cm; 108.5 × 131 × 3.5 cm; 115 × 132 × 3.5 cm; 113 × 133 × 4.5 cm; 93 × 147 × 4.5 cm; 93 × 147 × 3 cm; 115 × 150 × 2 cm; 120 × 152 × 3.5 cm; 53 × 186 × 4 cm; 149 × 181 × 3 cm; 149 × 181 × 3 cm; 149 × 181 × 3 cm; 149 × 181 × 3 cm; 149 × 181 × 2.5 cm; 149 × 181 × 2.5 cm; 149 × 181 × 2.5 cm; 149 × 181 × 4.5 cm; 149 × 181 × 2.5 cm; 149 × 181 × 2.5 cm; 97.5 × 115.5 × 3.5 cm; 135.5 × 164.5 × 3 cm; 140.5 × 172 × 3 cm; 100 × 140 × 2 cm; 125 × 153.5 × 3.5 cm; 120.5 × 164.5 × 3 cm; 121 × 180 × 5 cm; 123 × 147 × 3 cm; 135.5 × 165.5 × 3 cm; 93 × 147 × 4.5 cm; 116 × 140 × 3.5 cm; 93 × 147 × 4.5 cm; 93 × 147 × 4.5 cm; 135 × 195 × 4 cm; 149 × 181 × 2.5 cm; 140 × 197.5 × 3 cm; 140 × 197.5 × 3 cm; 135 × 195 × 4 cm; 150.5 × 183 × 3.5 cm; 140 × 180.5 × 5 cm; 149 × 181 × 2.5 cm; 149 × 181 × 2.5 cm; 149 × 181 × 4.5 cm

Chromogenic print on photographic paper

Museo Reina Sofía

Through a boundless strategy of accumulation, Política hidráulica brings together almost a hundred photographs of dams and reservoirs dotted throughout the Iberian Peninsula. The emphasis on aerial views and certain framings lends a sculptural dimension to the engineering projects in the installation, embodying a factual archive that is almost unreal.

The accumulated images not only show how large infrastructures and industrialization processes definitively shaped the landscape—and our way of looking at it—but also draw attention to their role as mechanisms of appropriation and control. Thus, Política hidráulica springs from an approach that questions landscape representations as a space immune from connotation.

This series begins with an exploration of the first reservoir, which was still under construction at the time the photographs were taken. As part of the twentieth-century hydrological plan it is quite recent, and its construction gave rise to strong protests. The effects on the landscape and the anthropological effects were photographed first and foremost for documentary purposes. The camera captured the social context and actions opposing the huge infrastructure that would extinguish life in the area.

The realism of the images obtained was in line with this day-to-day space, and discouraged media coverage. However, this was the link that prompted the artist to look for the contrasting bird’s-eye view, and to approach the erasure of the place from the distance typical of images of power. As such, the photographers flew over the territory, adopting the perspective of corporate reportage.

These first photographs attempted to replicate the process used by specialists. Rather than turning to existing snapshots (from offices, etc.), there was an attempt to recreate the actual reality, using the codes of the period in which the discipline had a mission. A learning process was involved in following the technique of similar photographic reports. But the results of this approach revealed the problems involved in constructing images, insofar as the technology and ways of looking have changed over time.

For this reason, professionals were commissioned to take the photographs in Política hidráulica. Interpreting earlier instructions, they flew over each site, taking off from the nearest airfield. A methodology was thus established and the series was completed in several actions, over several years, shaping the historical sequence in reverse time.

This series of photographs is not intended to cover an entire geographical area, but rather follows the layout of the systems that have shaped resource extraction and distribution processes over the last century. The infrastructures, which are usually located in remote and unpopulated areas, produced the energy that was transmitted through power lines to the more industrialized regions, under the control of corporations.