Allotment III
The work of renowned British artist Antony Gormley, “Allotment III”, is exhibited on the campus of the University of Monterrey, discover how this installation transforms and dialogues with the academic space.
The work of British artist Antony Gormley, Allotment III, is displayed on the UDEM Campus, adding to the cultural richness of the area and the daily life of the academic community. Created in 2008, from the measurements of 300 people from Monterrey, the work evokes, in the artist's words: “Bodies and buildings, cities and cells, monuments and intimacies, each of the 'rooms'; in this piece is someone´s, is connected to the moving body of an individual, alive and living.”.
BACKGROUND
From November 2008 to April 2009, the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Monterrey (MARCO) hosted a major solo exhibition of work by Antony Gormley. Spanning nearly 30 years of the artist’s work, the exhibition featured sculptures and drawings as well as site-specific installations which catalysed different areas of the museum. The exhibition reflected on Gormley’s lifelong engagement with the body as a found object and saw it transformed through a range of materials, processes and collaborations.
One such collaboration that rethinks the body and its relationship to space is Allotment III, a large-scale work developed specifically for the exhibition with the engagement of the local community. Allotment III comprises 300 life-size bunkers made of reinforced concrete. Each of the hollow, standing bunkers is made from the precise measurements of 300 inhabitants of Monterrey who volunteered to take part in the project. These measurements were then used to cast each concrete body case. Together, the rows of bunkers, some clustered in groups suggesting interpersonal relations and others standing alone, form a collective body as a landscape or cityscape.
At the end of its presentation at MARCO, the work was donated by the artist to the museum and remained in its collection for several years. After almost 10 years, Allotment III was integrated into the university campus to become part of its collection, now permanently installed and accessible to UDEM’s community and members of the public alike.
ITS 3 VERSIONS
There are three versions of the work: the first, with 112 elements, was presented in 1995 for the community of Hvinde Sande, Herning, Denmark; the second in 1996, for Malmö, Sweden, which featured 300 figures; and the last version for Monterrey, Mexico, also with 300 elements. Allotment is a project designed, in the words of the artist himself, “… to become an open ground for reflections on the relationship between territory and imagination, or between identity and control.”
SIGNIFICANCE FOR THE UDEM COMMUNITY
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Receiving the work of one of the most internationally recognized artists will be an opportunity to continue positioning the university as a cultural reference at an international level and to continue with its commitment to promoting art.
- Displaying a work that can lead to reflection on the relationship between the human being and society and space at large, as well as an encounter with sculpture that can question one’s own position in the world.
Antony Gormley
Antony Gormley is widely acclaimed for his sculptures, installations, and public artworks that investigate the relationship of the human body to space.
Gormley's work has been exhibited throughout the UK and internationally, receiving significant recognition. In 1997 he was made an Officer of the British Empire (OBE) and was made a knight in the New Year’s Honours list in 2014. Additionally, Gormley is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects, an Honorary Doctor of the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Trinity and Jesus Colleges, Cambridge. Gormley has been a Royal Academician since 2003.
Acknowledgments
Collaborators UDEM
| Dr. Carlos García González |
| Alessandra Perlatti |
| Braulio Dominguez Godoy |
| Blanca Nohemí Gamboa Juárez |
| Citlalli Elizabeth Calderón Villegas |
| María Guadalupe Mayela Quijas Palos |
| José Ángel Paredes |
| Luis Gilberto Castillo Garza |
| Eduardo Oyervides |
Scholars UDEM
| Dana Esmeralda Molina Campos |
| Roberta González Molina |
| Camila Izaguirre |
External Collaborators
| Leonardo Martínez Camarena |
| José Alejandro Morales Vázquez |
| Elena Bowen |
| Lucinda Linderman |
| Arturo Barbosa |
| Juan Carlos González |
| Salvador Palacios |
| Yovany Banda |
| Santiago García |
| Armando Martínez |
| Roberto Brígido |
| Reynaldo Rubio |
| Jose Santos Celedon |
| Florencio Blanco |
| Aurelio Zapata |
| Julian Martínez |
| Ana Karen Pérez |
| Arbiv Sulub |
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