ISAAC CORDAL at RAS Gallery

Elise — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 12:13:04 +0000

ISAAC CORDAL – Solo Show

RAS Gallery Barcelona . Carrer Doctor Dou 10
Opening Friday April 13th from 7.30 till 10 pm
Exhibition runs from April 13th till May 12th
Curated by Maximiliano Ruiz

Isaac Cordal just opened his new solo show at the RAS Gallery in Barcelona.

In 2007 the Spanish building industry used 54.2 million tones of cement. This factoid did not escape the thoughtful attentions of one very interesting Galician digital nomad, namely Isaac Cordal. Cordal saw this frenzied ‘cementisation’ of the world around him as evidence of our deep alienation from an ongoing conflict with the natural environment. So, being an artist very much obsessed with the problem of the human body Cordal appropriated cement as the tool for his own intervention in the built environment. What this means in laymen’s terms is that he used cement to make his art and in this case his art was sculptures of little people.

Also check out his latest project as part of the Beaufort04 Triennial , which is also displayed in the gallery above.

Isaac Cordal

Castle Magazine — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 19:34:04 +0000

Isaac Cordal …is a sculpture artist from London. His sculptures take the form of little people sculpted from concrete in ‘real’ situations. Cordal manages to capture a lot of emotion in his vignettes, in spite of their lack of detail or colour. He is sympathetic toward his little people and we empathise with their situations, their leisure time, their waiting for buses and their more tragic moments such as accidental death, suicide or family funerals. His sculptures can be found in gutters, on top of buildings, on top of bus shelters – in many unusual and unlikely places in the capital. This book is the first time his images have been shown in together in one book dedicated to his work. Many images never seen before Cordal’s concrete sculptures are like little magical gifts to the public that only a few lucky people will see and love but so many more will have missed. Left to their own devices throughout London Cordal what really makes these pieces magical is their placement. They bring new meaning to little corners of the urban environment. They express something vulnerable but deeply engaging. Left to fend for themselves, you almost want to protect them in some way, or perhaps communicate with them. Of course the 25cm high sculptures of people in everyday poses the artist creates in are not real, are they? Well you’ve opened a whole can of worms with that question. Yes, the little scenes in Concrete Eclipse are somewhat poignant but they do not invite you to weep passively for lost worlds you never knew. They are there to provide a one handed clap to shake you from your reveries and plug you back in to the world. So Cordall’s men in grey are a little message of hope in spite of their forlorn appearance and they are there to remind you that pessimism is not common sense, it’s just pessimism. So make sure you do something inessential today. Go on, the grey men don’t want you to.

Modart » Isaac Cordal

ISAAC CORDAL at RAS Gallery

Isaac Cordal