Poets have been a vital force in the art world since at least Baudelaire's day, but more recently they have been infiltrating major contemporary art surveys (such as the 2015 New Museum Triennial) and fairs. The Mexico City-based poetry group Oa4s (shorthand for "On All Fours"), whose members make sculptural installations that serve as sets for theatrical video performances, has participated in NADA Miami Beach (2015) and the Material Art Fair (2014). Here, the members share their favorite pieces from this year's Material fair.
OA4S
Sweetgum ball
Lodos Gallery
This is our own work and we thought we should begin with her. We found a younger her like this, in harmony, and brought her up close to our chests. The dogs are barking (she doesn't care). We must make way for her to rest.
KATELYN REEVES
A Man Who Had For A Time Become The Embodiment Of A Popular Ideal Is Made To Realize That As A Person He Is Not This Ideal
Sade Gallery
A precarity, in fact: a bloody elbow. “That’s quite a scrape,” he said. The body can break and bleed, we think. “OH NO,” they say. “OH YES,” she insists.
LIBBY ROTHFELD
No Friend of Mine 2
Kimberly-Klark
Tehe.
VEIT LAURENT KURZ
Welcome to No Future
What Pipeline
This painting we love. Look: it is a close up of another painting.
It means that you don’t have to get so close to the painting to see the painting in the painting. They say “laugh now and cry later” but we don’t believe in later.
JAIMIE WARREN
Somebody to Love
American Medium
This is a video and we couldn’t watch it on the Artspace preview site, but this "still" stood out to us. All we read from a face, right?
BALAM BARTOLOME
Bubble
Kandor 13
We like that this is a cocoon. We also work with that as a theme in our work sometimes. We wonder who planted a tree in the wall in the first place. No wonder it's all sticking o000(00ut.
…./-----|-
?????O,\
BALAM BARTOLOME
Prisioneros
Kandor 13
A = B minus parts of A, or the reverse. We like that these two images establish an unsettling pun between visually similar scenarios: Captive, captive, undergarments, and two and a half men.
We can easily say the ratio of violence-used and whom it is used upon is relative to the status of the victim. For instance, Suspect A stole a soda and a bag of chips, is black and is shot killed. Suspect B Murdered 12 people, is white and taken safely into custody. We are not safe.
ERIKA CERUZZI
dullnise
Springsteen
What’s equally unsettling is this. An arrangement of pipes, tape, and a fuse? We can only remember something if it has an accompanying rhyme or acronym. Ceruzzi reminds us of jacuzzi. Painting Isn’t Popular Ever
JORGE DE LEÓN
Estudio de luz y sombras
Proyectos Ultravioleta
This is also a nice still. We weren’t able to view the video but the man climbing inside of this dead horse/cow is something out of a caravaggio painting. They say there is more than one way to skin a dead cat, but we only know one proper procedure for gutting a horse/cow’s corpse and wearing the carcass like a ball gown. [Insert centaur reference here!]
TEMRA PAVLOVIC
Snake
Lodos Gallery
This photo of the foot of a sculpture, very simple. What goes up must come down. Just as the ripest, sweetest fruit hangs by a mere thread, so periods of prosperity can fall of their own weight.
