Inés Lombardi: Past Present – Close and Distant – A Contemporary Art Exhibition at Secession

This exhibition features the work of Inés Lombardi, exploring complex themes of travel, perception, and cultural hybridity through a diverse body of work developed since the late 1980s. The installation in the Secession's main space invites visitors to find their own paths through a structured environment that incorporates photography, video, and spatial design.

The exhibition 'Past Present – Close and Distant' by Inés Lombardi showcases the artist's long-term engagement with themes of perception, travel, and cultural diversity, developed since the late 1980s. The installation within the Secession's main hall is designed to facilitate a personal journey of discovery for visitors, encouraging them to follow their own associative threads through clearly structured spatial arrangements. Initially, stark black and white photographic works from 1990 mark the poles of the exhibition, leading to a video projection that serves as an introduction to a multifaceted sensory experience. The exhibition design, utilizing colored partition walls, creates intimate thematic areas while maintaining visual connections to other parts of the installation. Central to Lombardi's exploration are the garden landscapes of Residência Olivo Gomes and Fazenda Vargem Grande, designed by Brazilian landscape architect Roberto Burle Marx. These serve as a starting point for examining diversity and heterogeneity, and the process of hybridization in national culture, acknowledging Brazil's position relative to dominant European cultural models. The artist draws connections to early Brazilian Modernism, referencing manifestos such as Oswald de Andrade's Pau-Brasil and Anthropophagic Manifesto. The text highlights the influence of early scientific expeditions and their visual representations on the perception of tropical nature, as exemplified by works of Thomas Ender and Augustin de Saint-Hilaire, and how this shaped Burle Marx's designs. Lombardi's photographic works precisely address these multiplicities, enabling individual elements to communicate with each other. Her approach to color choices for the partition walls, textures of drawings, and collections of natural elements (roots, leaves, insects) all foster associations, investigating the relationships between nature, its construction, urbanity, and the formation of Brazilian cultural identity.

Information regarding tickets is available via a link to the Secession's ticketing portal. General opening hours are Tuesday to Sunday, 10 AM to 6 PM. The page does not specify separate ticketing for this exhibition beyond general admission context provided via a link to the ticketing site.