In 1932, Walter Benjamin sojourned in Ibiza, where he wrote about the island\u2019s fauna and flora in a style alternating between considerate description and poetic abstraction. A recent work by artist Lorna Bauer referencing Benjamin\u2019s time in Spain also bears the nameIbiza <\/em>: a long columnar mobile composed of various pieces of coloured glass interlinked with bronze-cast bamboo branches and, petrified in transparent resin, fig slices and sprigs of thyme. By juxtaposing found, sculpted, or cast materials, the Ibiza<\/em> assemblage contrasts with the photographic work for which Bauer has become known. In recent works, she has put photography in the strict sense aside to focus on works oscillating between objects and their representation. Presented together in the exhibition space, images and sculptures evoke imprints, captures, mouldings, and traces. Bauer also pays close attention to the patina of the sculptural works: the green bronze foliage in Bromeliad (Margaret Mee)<\/em> #1, for example, evokes the plant\u2019s primal nature. In this sense, Bauer\u2019s works, combining mimesis with a sensitive use of materials, share an affinity with the tone of some of Benjamin\u2019s narratives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other recent works by Bauer establish a dialogue between built and landscape architecture. One series, devoted to the home of architect Arthur Erickson, captures the play of reflections from the building\u2019s windows, through which the viewer indirectly discovers the surrounding garden. This garden becomes a kind of liminal zone, at once public and private, that both magnifies and obscures Erickson\u2019s architecture. In a similar vein, during a recent research residency in Rio de Janeiro, Bauer extensively photographed the former principal residence of architect Roberto Burle Marx. Today a heritage site protected by UNESCO, the adjacent immaculately maintained gardens are home to one of the biggest collections of tropical plants in the world. In Bauer\u2019s work, we discover the architecture of both Erickson and Burle Marx not through systematic photography, but through fragments and layers : the buildings, no longer the central object of the photographs, regain a certain plasticity and are filled with life anew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Translated from the French by Louise Ashcroft<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\n