Renata Lucas: Architectural Interventions Exploring Space and Interaction in Exhibition

Renata Lucas's exhibition explores how built environments influence social interactions through site-specific interventions. The show features rotating doors that guide visitors and activate sound installations, deconstructing perceptions of space and movement.

Renata Lucas's exhibition at the Secession delves into the influence of the built environment on social relationships and actions, viewing architectural elements as the language of a place. Through site-specific interventions, Lucas manipulates structures to deconstruct socially defined spaces and their uses, proposing new, playful possibilities. She employs methods of addition, duplication, or layering to create subtle changes that offer an alternative perception of a location. In the gallery, Lucas realized her intervention titled "Ø" (Secession 2014). Two reversible revolving doors, designed to blend with the building's architecture, guide visitors in a dance-like motion from the entrance to the gallery and towards the opposite emergency exit. These doors also serve as a mechanical drive for two turntables embedded in the floor. When a door rotates, a sound is triggered: the visitors' movement and the sound are immediately synchronized. The melody of a pop song, however, sounds distorted—too high, too low, or even backward—depending on the speed and direction the door is operated. Referencing her spatial intervention and visitor movement, Lucas selected short lyrical excerpts: "she'll come," "she'll go." These song lines are trapped in an endless loop, as the record needle repeatedly jumps back, blocked by a piece of tape. The conceptual starting point for Lucas's interventions at the Secession is the narrative "Plan de evasión" (1945) by Argentinian writer Adolfo Bioy Casares. Through diary entries, a prisoner recounts his warden's dubious experiments on a prison island off French Guiana, where the warden manipulates inmates' sensory perceptions to let them experience freedom, albeit only in thought. Against this literary backdrop, and confronted with the restrictions of a protected historical building, Renata Lucas attempts to underscore the connection between interior and exterior space within the hermetic spatial situation in the Secession's basement. Lucas's work "Plan de evasión" (Secession 2014) finds an extraordinary way to reach unsuspecting readers and thus their audience: the artist has divided Casares's narrative into six chapters, which are smuggled into books from the Secession Shop's inventory. A bookbinder removed pages from selected books and bound in their place the respective fragments of Casares's text in the original Spanish. This way, the pages are integrated almost imperceptibly, parasitically, into the books. Lucas's interventions at the Secession, comprising literary fragments, looped song lyrics, and architectural elements, literally and figuratively create an escape route. In both cases, the exhibition visitors prove to be the protagonists who complete her work.

Tickets for the exhibition can be purchased via the Secession shop. General admission details and ticketing information are available on the Secession website. Visitors are directed to the official ticketing platform for purchases and further details. Hours: Open today, Tuesday-Sunday, 10 AM - 6 PM. Admission is typically covered by museum entry, with specific ticketing information available on their website. Exhibition dates: November 21, 2014 – January 25, 2015. No specific pricing details were found on this page, beyond a general link to the shop. Consider general museum admission if not purchasing separately. Bookings can be made online via the provided link. Visit the website for detailed visitor information and opening hours. No specific details about free entry or special discounts were mentioned. It is recommended to check the official ticketing site for the most current information regarding prices and availability. This exhibition is part of the Secession's programming and general visitor information applies. Information about tickets and admission is available on the Secession website.