Matadero Madrid center for contemporary creation
VISITA GUIADA
Elena Alonso
Institution
Visita Guiada (Guided Visit) is a site-specific intervention by Elena Alonso in what used to be the former cold-storage room of the municipal slaughterhouse. The artist’s proposal stems from the idea of finding ourselves in an isolated chamber where there is hardly any communication with the outside world, and the concept of preservation, which has been linked to this space throughout its history.
After a number of visits to the building, the artist began to notice all the visual information that remained on the walls and ceilings. What caught her attention the most was a series of holes spread across the ceiling of the aisles, closed down during the most recent refurbishments.
The intervention proposes a tour of the building using a banister as a guide. A line drawn on the plan like a drawing but, on this occasion, shaped like a sculpture. It has been created with different materials including wood, cement, cork, painted plaster and copper, and shows the artist’s interest in crafts and design; both the tour and the touch of the materials used for creating the work delight visitors.
We find this original guide in the darkness of the building, and it invites us to discover a new perspective of the space. The holes have been reopened, light filters through and another gallery can be glimpsed up above, which used to be hidden from the visitors’ gaze.
This artistic intervention is a play on contrasts, obstacles and possibilities. In a way, it reminds us of visitable caves where the tour reveals the particular geomorphology that is still present in its previously static environment. In this case, the painstaking care with which the banister has been prepared contrasts with the brutality of the space.
The banister is both a guide and a barrier, a line that steers clear of obstacles and adds to the architecture of the building. A piece we can see and touch, one that lets us discover an unexpected place above our heads, though we only catch a glimpse of it in the distance. Elena Alonso (Madrid, 1981) has a degree in Fine Arts and a Master’s in Art, Creation and Research from the Complutense University of Madrid. She has also studied in Sweden and Finland. Her work is mainly based on drawing, which she relates to other disciplines such as architecture, craftwork and design, paying special attention to the problems linked to a lack of emotion towards the environment. Solo exhibitions include ‘El espacio alrededor’, ABC Museum (2016); ‘Canto Blando’ (2016),‘Composición de lugar’ (2014) and ‘La tapadera’ (2012) atEspacio Valverde; atthe Region of Madrid’s Sala de Arte Joven (2011); and ‘Paredes de piel’ (2007) at Cable Factory in Helsinki. Abierto x Obras, at Matadero Madrid, is a site-specific intervention programme that invites artists to create a new piece, encouraging the experimental nature of contemporary creation and exploring the relationship between art and the place in which it is displayed: the former cold-storage room of Matadero.” “It has taken Elena Alonso, X-Flash and her team ten weeks to produce the piece, working in a specially prepared studio in Nave 16 at Matadero Madrid, to then transfer a large part of the intervention to Abierto x Obras.
After a number of visits to the building, the artist began to notice all the visual information that remained on the walls and ceilings. What caught her attention the most was a series of holes spread across the ceiling of the aisles, closed down during the most recent refurbishments.
The intervention proposes a tour of the building using a banister as a guide. A line drawn on the plan like a drawing but, on this occasion, shaped like a sculpture. It has been created with different materials including wood, cement, cork, painted plaster and copper, and shows the artist’s interest in crafts and design; both the tour and the touch of the materials used for creating the work delight visitors.
We find this original guide in the darkness of the building, and it invites us to discover a new perspective of the space. The holes have been reopened, light filters through and another gallery can be glimpsed up above, which used to be hidden from the visitors’ gaze.
This artistic intervention is a play on contrasts, obstacles and possibilities. In a way, it reminds us of visitable caves where the tour reveals the particular geomorphology that is still present in its previously static environment. In this case, the painstaking care with which the banister has been prepared contrasts with the brutality of the space.
The banister is both a guide and a barrier, a line that steers clear of obstacles and adds to the architecture of the building. A piece we can see and touch, one that lets us discover an unexpected place above our heads, though we only catch a glimpse of it in the distance. Elena Alonso (Madrid, 1981) has a degree in Fine Arts and a Master’s in Art, Creation and Research from the Complutense University of Madrid. She has also studied in Sweden and Finland. Her work is mainly based on drawing, which she relates to other disciplines such as architecture, craftwork and design, paying special attention to the problems linked to a lack of emotion towards the environment. Solo exhibitions include ‘El espacio alrededor’, ABC Museum (2016); ‘Canto Blando’ (2016),‘Composición de lugar’ (2014) and ‘La tapadera’ (2012) atEspacio Valverde; atthe Region of Madrid’s Sala de Arte Joven (2011); and ‘Paredes de piel’ (2007) at Cable Factory in Helsinki. Abierto x Obras, at Matadero Madrid, is a site-specific intervention programme that invites artists to create a new piece, encouraging the experimental nature of contemporary creation and exploring the relationship between art and the place in which it is displayed: the former cold-storage room of Matadero.” “It has taken Elena Alonso, X-Flash and her team ten weeks to produce the piece, working in a specially prepared studio in Nave 16 at Matadero Madrid, to then transfer a large part of the intervention to Abierto x Obras.
