With Disembodiment, José Salinas explores the obscure relationship between the body and its urban context.
The visitors to the A trans Pavilion in Berlin who came to see the José Salinas Disembodiment installation were definitely in for an unusual art experience. Cubes (made of GFRP waffle mold material) were lined up in rows, forcing the visitor to jump from one island to the next, turning the show into a rather cumbersome balancing act. Attendees were able to experience first-hand the mission behind Salinas’ work, namely to shed light on the obscure and intimate relationship between architecture, the body and the individual’s interiority.
The Spanish architect’s spatial artwork proves that an architectural setting and environment may subconsciously influence our mind and consequently our body. In this “simulation”, the visitor goes through a process of disembodiment which mirrors an experience that we all may have in our own daily urban contexts. “Disembodiment is a process of becoming.” Meaning: inner areas penetrate into outer areas; the individual’s interiority becomes one with their surroundings. The same way our skin is sensitive to light and climate, our subconscious is sensitive towards shapes and surfaces.
Modeled after Greek and Egyptian sculpture, representations of female and male heads in black, white and green depicted on high definition Ilfochromes are the centerpiece of the installation. The images, which are positioned in a grid, reflect the structure of buildings and, moreover, combine the organic and the constructed. Architecture and body melt into one.
Salinas’ Disembodiment blends art, design and architecture into a unique configuration that merges the installation perfectly into its city surroundings with the help of the showroom’s large windows.
Focusing on architectural design, José Salinas founded the New York and Madrid-based KNOBSDesign in 2002.
Links:
www.knobsdesign.com
www.atrans.org
