CAMPO Benefit Auction 2023

Artwork Description
The monoblock chair is considered the most basic, accessible and democratic symbol in the history of contemporary design. I’m very interested in simple objects, particularly the ones that we dismiss or disdain. These objects may appear soulless in their original state, but something is revealed or unleashed when we change their medium. The luster and warmth of bronze literally recasts these artefacts of the everyday, and so a plastic garden chair suddenly becomes luminous and worthy. I think that it’s powerful for viewers to recognise the elements they use every day, and to see them revalued through a material change, a new arrangement or a certain staging. This shift can spark questions and offer a new way to understand what we choose and what surrounds us on a daily basis. As they undergo a sea-change from plastic to fine metal, these chairs enshrine themselves within a world of value, though they continue to conjure the dingy material ingrained in our visual memory. As amalgams of what is most average and most unusual, this simple arrangement of table and chair is jarring and attractive, beautiful and perplexing.

Bio
Luna Paiva gilds objects that were not born to be art, but had a nude life of their own. Mounted rocks, succulent plants and cacti, they are species of a wild realm that seems habitual: inhabitants of Creation, like us. Her objects speak of a life that preexisted the human eye. Her gilded still lifes play with the sacred layers of fetish present in contemporary art but also spanning from an ancient tradition, where casting gold embodied a sacred anima. Ready-mades of nature gilded for profane adoration. Luna Paiva was born in Paris in 1980. She has a Licence in Art History and Archeology from La Sorbonne and studied film at NYU. Her artistic mediums are sculpture, installation and photography, her work has been shown in exhibitions in Latin America, Europe and the United States Set designer for the opera Hercules en el Mato Grosso, CETC/Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires 2014 and Hercules in Mato Grosso, Dixon Place New York 2015 selected and co-produced by Americas Society, New York. She made two installations for Hermès: Artist's Windows in Buenos Aires 2014 and in Barcelona 2016. She also made a collaboration with Ferragamo in 2019 with Paul Andrew and Cartier in 2020. As a photographer she worked for editorial media such as Vogue Italia, L'officiel Art, Barzón, The Skirt Chronicles and Apartamento. Awarded with the second prize at Maurizio Cattelan's collaborative installation, Eternity 2018, Art Basel cities curated by Cecilia Alemani, Itaú Art Prize in 2013 and Buenos Aires Photo Petrobras Art Prize in 2011. She's part of the Museum of Modern Art Buenos Aires permanent collection.

www.lunapaiva.com
@lunapaiva_