IVÁN NAVARRO

Born in 1972 in Santiago, Chile, Iván Navarro grew up under the regime of Pinochet before moving to New York in 1997. Fascinated by the codes of minimalism and American design, hebuilds electric sculptures whose raw material is light itself. Haunted by his experience of the dictatorship, his work subtly intertwines artistic references and political engagement. He uses lighting, optical illusions and wordplay as tools to transform space, shift perceptions andexplore questions of power and control. Over the years, he has created pieces that, behindtheir enticing appearance as light installations, evoke the darkest themes of our time: torture,imprisonment, domination, north-south inequalities and political propaganda.

With Planetarium, Iván Navarro takes the viewer on a poetic journey through cosmic landscapes. Constellations, nebulae and eclipses inhabit large panels of illuminated glasswhich open like windows onto infinite space. Both sublime and slightly disturbing, hisimaginary maps question the limits of astronomy, mental representations andanthropocentrism. At the heart of this star-strewn voyage, pieces such as Shard refer toshattering blasts; and Mirage also implies a latent violence.

As Iván Navarro explains ‘observing the stars is like touching the greatest secrets of the universe with your fingertips.’ Which gives rise to metaphysical probing: what are the originsof our civilisation? Is history bound to repeat itself? What role could we imagine for humanbeings in a constantly expanding universe?

This questioning process is driven by the artist’s incursion into hitherto uncharted territory: the use of paint as a working medium. For the first time, Iván Navarro, whose practice hasthoroughly explored the boundaries between design, architecture and sculpture, is taking upthe paintbrush. Repeating the same movement over and over, he meticulously engraves thenpaints and pours thousands of splashes of vivid colour inside one-way mirrors, transformingthe LED lights into explosions and celestial phenomena. This cathartic approach underscoresthe artist’s examination of the modern human-machine pairing. He sets the object - anindustrial-style mirror - against the arbitrary nature of the human hand, the singularity ofhuman touch, the fragility of the human being.

Iván Navarro currently lives and works In New York. He represented Chile at the 53rd Venice Biennale in 2009. Over recent years, his work has been shown worldwide: Bifocal, Museo deArte Contemporaneo, Buenos Aires (2019); This Land is Your Land, Momentary, part of theCrystal Bridges Museum, USA (2019); This Land is Your Land, solo, Busan Museum, Korea; Ageof Terror, Imperial War Museum, London (2018); Light and Space, Guggenheim Bilbao, Spain(2017); Art Basel Parcours, Switzerland; Yinchuan Biennale, China (2016); Under the Same Sun,South London Gallery (2016 and Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York,2014); Storylines, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2015); Light Show, HaywardGallery, London and Sharjah Art Foundation, Sharjah (2013 - 2016).His art features in a great many international collections, including the Solomon R.Guggenheim Museum (New York), The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden(Washington, DC) and the Fonds National d’Art Contemporain (Paris). He has been represented by Galerie Templin since 2005. This Spring, the city of San Francisco inaugurated The Ladder, a new permanent installation by the artist.

This winter, a retrospective of his work will be on show at Centquatre, Paris, from 9 January to 28 February 2021. Publishing house Skira is co-publishing a catalogue with Galerie Templon.Welcome is a 200-page work with texts by José-Manuel Gonçalvès, director of CentquatreParis, Pablo Leon de la Barra, curator, and Alfredo Jaar, artist, architect and filmmake