An engaging installation, "Un cuerpo extraño" by Rui Macedo reimagines the Museo Nacional de Artes Decorativas. The artist strategically integrates his contemporary paintings with selected, often unseen, pieces from the museum's historical collection. Curated by José María Parreño, this project uses trompe-l'oeil and false perspective to blur boundaries and invite visitors to question their perceptions of art and space, transforming historical pieces with renewed significance.
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This exhibition by Rui Macedo transforms the Museo Nacional de Artes Decorativas by integrating his paintings with the museum's collection. The artist's interventions aim to offer new readings of the museum's space and objects, encouraging visitors to reconsider their perspectives.
Rui Macedo's exhibition 'Un cuerpo extraño' (A Strange Body) is an installation-based project conceived specifically for the Museo Nacional de Artes Decorativas. The artist, known for his interventions in historical museums, engages with the museum's conventions of exhibition, circulation, and contemplation. Macedo selects pieces from the museum's collection, often unseen by the public, and re-contextualizes them alongside his own 66 paintings. These works employ sophisticated visual artifices like trompe-l'oeil and false perspective, often blurring the lines between painting and object. The exhibition dramatically transforms the gallery spaces, altering the viewer's perspective by modifying doors, adding steps, and elevating floors. This approach encourages a serious playfulness, inviting visitors to question assumptions and experience the museum's collection as if for the first time. Curated by José María Parreño, the exhibition also touches upon themes of still life, portraiture, interiors, vanitas, self-portraiture, and landscape, creating a dialogue between contemporary art and decorative arts. The exhibition's title, 'Un Cuerpo Extraño', reflects Macedo's own positioning within the museum context. His paintings are designed to 'fade away' to highlight the museum's architectural constructions and unconventional object arrangements. The intervention also includes unseen mirrors and vanitas imagery, prompting reflection on vanity and the passage of time. This dynamic staging aims to activate the exhibition spaces and imbue the historical pieces with renewed significance, ultimately questioning the perception of museums as mere mausoleums.
Entry to the temporary exhibitions is free of charge. The museum is located at C/ Montalbán, 12, 28014 Madrid. Visitor information including opening hours is provided.
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