Andra Ursuța Explained

Andra Ursuța
Birth Date:1979
Nationality:Romanian
Education:Columbia University (BA)
Occupation:Sculptor

Andra Ursuța (born 1979) is a Romanian-American sculptor who has lived and worked in New York since 2000.[1] Ursuța is known for her nihilistic portrayal of the human condition, confronting issues such as patriotism, violence against women, and the “expulsion of ethnic groups”.[2] [3] Ursuța's work is held in public collections worldwide.[4] [5]

Early life

Ursuța was born in 1979 in Salonta, (Hungarian: Nagyszalonta) Romania, a town on the Romanian-Hungarian border under the Communist leadership of Nicolae Ceaușescu.[6] [7] She emigrated to the United States in 1997, and moved to New York in 1999. In 2002, Ursuța received a Bachelor of Arts in Art History and Visual Arts from Columbia University in New York City.[8]

Career

Ursuța's works draw on her personal narrative, while simultaneously speaking to mutually defined cultural experiences.[9] Ursuța uses a variety of media, merging traditional sculpture with new technologies to transform common materials into visceral sculptures and installations.[10]

Many of Ursuța's sculptures begin as assemblages of vessels, scrap materials, and renderings of the human body. Conceptually, Ursuța's sculptures contain a collection of cultural references ranging from rock-n-roll to health cults. Ursuța has been named "a master of materials, craft, form, political commentary, recent history, magical insight and sculptural power"[11] for her weaving of the visual and the conceptual.

Ursuța has stated that she is no crusader, and that she's "just... reflecting unspoken attitudes that form the undercurrent of images and news stories, and the way contemporary experience is framed."[12]

In her Stoner (2013) installation, Ursuța uses a fenced-off pitching machine that hurtles round rocks at a tiled wall containing strands of long, black hair (as if depicting that women are walled up inside) to explore themes of organized misogyny, jock culture, and competitive aggression.

In a 2012 New York Times review of Ursuța's Magical Terrorism, the newspaper's chief art critic Roberta Smith notes a relationship between Ursuța's personal experience and a wider generational experience. The sculptures contrast “systems of belief, economics and display, as well as different states of otherness. The disturbing impression is of time running backward, of civilization devolving.”

More recent shows by Ursuța combine both cutting-edge and ancient processes in their construction. Ursuța's "Nobodies" (2019) with its six glass sculptures[13] – uses both 3-D printing and ancient lost-wax casting, contrasting free will and choice, life and death, and ambition and helplessness. As described in an essay by Chris Wiley, this work captures the human tendency to “strive and stretch and sweat our way towards a more perfect body, and a calmer, clearer mind, [although] the undertow of decay will always be too strong for us to fight." The sculptures, the delicacy of their material and the intimacy of their forms, offer a sobering truth that “our bodies and our histories will vanish, like raindrops in an ocean squall. All of this might be for nothing, all of us might be nobodies.” As Ursuța defamiliarizes the bodily form, the remaining figures perhaps reveal "...our brains…locked in the prisons of our dying bodies."[14] In the 2022 Venice Biennale, Ursuța's work was noted in the Telegraph as being "simultaneously alluring and unsettling crystalline figures, like cyborg amputees imagined by a female alter ego of Jacob Epstein."[15] Ursuța's exhibit in the show was also noted in a review by Vanity Fair.[16]

Collections

Ursuţa's work is held in public collections worldwide, including the Aïshti Foundation, Beirut; DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art, Athens; Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Turin, Italy; Hammer Museum, University of California, Los Angeles; Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami; and the Rubell Museum, Miami; and the Pérez Art Museum Miami, Florida.[17] Ursuţa has been featured in three Venice biennials: 2013, 2019, and 2022. Ursuţa lives and works in New York.

Solo exhibitions

Ursuța's first solo exhibition – Andra Ursuța: The Management of Barbarism – was displayed in 2010 at Ramiken Crucible, NY. Since 2010, Ursuța's work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at prominent venues in the U.S. as well as internationally.[18] [19] [20]

Group exhibitions

Ursuța's work has also been included in several domestic and international group exhibitions.[32] [33] [34] [35]

Sources

Notes and References

  1. Book: Proceedings of the United States National Museum Vol. 42. . 1912 . Government Printing Office . Washington, D.C. . 10.5962/bhl.title.142627 .
  2. Web site: 2012-12-18 . The Artist in Mourning: Andra Ursuta . 2022-03-30 . Interview Magazine . en-US.
  3. Book: Joy, Jenn . The Choreographic . MIT Press . 2014 . 9780262325998 . 159–161 . English.
  4. Web site: Cantor . Steven L. . 2020-02-27 . A Comparison of the 3 Phases of the High Line Part 6 - Public Art . 2022-03-30 . Greenroofs.com . en.
  5. Book: Schlieckau, Frauke . The fifth BMW Art Guide by Independent Collectors: The global guide to private collections of contemporary art. . Hatje Cantz Verlag GmbH . 2018 . 9783775744997 . Berlin, Germany.
  6. Web site: Judah . Hettie . 2018-12-21 . Aggressive Masculinity and Radical Politics: How Extremism Has Emerged as the Teenage Rebellion of Choice . 2022-03-30 . Frieze . en.
  7. Web site: Estefan . Kareem . 2012-12-23 . Andra Ursuta . 2022-03-30 . ARTnews.com . en-US.
  8. Web site: Hammer Projects: Andra Ursuta Hammer Museum . 2022-03-30 . hammer.ucla.edu . en.
  9. News: Smith . Roberta . 2011-08-11 . ANDRA URSUTA: 'Vandal Lust' . en-US . The New York Times . 2022-03-30 . 0362-4331.
  10. Book: Subotnick, A. . Andra Ursuta: 2000 Words . Deste Foundation for Contemporary Art. . 2018 . 9786185039271.
  11. News: Smith . Roberta . 2012-09-27 . ANDRA URSUTA: 'Magical Terrorism' . en-US . The New York Times . 2022-03-30 . 0362-4331.
  12. Book: Bernstein, Roslyn . Engaging Art - Essays and Interviews from Around the Globe . Cambridge Scholars Publishing . 2020 . 9781527550698 . Newcastle upon Tyne, UK . 121 . English.
  13. News: 2019-12-11 . What to See Right Now in New York Art Galleries . en-US . The New York Times . 2022-03-30 . 0362-4331.
  14. Web site: - Andra Ursuța - . 2022-03-30 . www.ramikencrucible.com . en.
  15. News: Sooke . Alastair . 2022-04-21 . At the Venice Biennale, surreal joys are in, Putin is out – and the stale males are hanging on . en-GB . The Telegraph . 2022-05-12 . 0307-1235.
  16. 2022-04-22 . It's Art! It's Marketing! It's Publicity!: Inside the Art and Fashion and Billionaire Bonanza at the Venice Biennale 2022 . 2022-05-12 . Vanity Fair . en-US.
  17. Web site: LaVelle . Ciara . Miami's Newest Museum Offers Some Serious Art Therapy . 2024-03-15 . Miami New Times . en.
  18. Web site: Curatorial Walk-Through of "Andra Ursuța: Alps" with Natalie Bell . 2022-03-30 . www.newmuseum.org . en.
  19. Web site: MASSIMODECARLO . London . Andra Ursuta: Enslavables at MASSIMODECARLO . 2022-03-30 . en-US.
  20. Web site: 2017-06-23 . Andra Ursuța "The Man From The Internet" at Massimo De Carlo, Milan — Mousse Magazine and Publishing . 2022-03-30 . www.moussemagazine.it . en-US.
  21. Web site: Andra Ursuta, "The Management of Barbarism" . 2022-05-23 . Time Out New York . en-US.
  22. News: Smith . Roberta . 2011-08-11 . ANDRA URSUTA: 'Vandal Lust' . en-US . The New York Times . 2022-05-23 . 0362-4331.
  23. Web site: 2014-03-06 . Andra Ursuta . 2022-05-23 . Meer . en.
  24. Web site: Curatorial Walk-Through of "Andra Ursuţa: Alps" with Natalie Bell . 2022-05-23 . www.newmuseum.org . en.
  25. Web site: Daily Art Fair . 2022-05-23 . dailyartfair.com . en.
  26. Web site: Andra Ursuta - Solitary Fitness - Exhibitions - Venus Over Manhattan . 2022-05-23 . www.venusovermanhattan.com . en.
  27. Web site: Andra Ursuta by Veronika Vogler - BOMB Magazine . 2022-05-23 . bombmagazine.org.
  28. Web site: MASSIMODECARLO . London . Andra Ursuta: Enslavables at MASSIMODECARLO . 2022-05-23 . en-US.
  29. Web site: New York – Andra Ursuta: "Ο Νότος θα εγερθεί ξανα (The South Will Rise Again)" at Ramiken Crucible Through July 12th, 2015 . 2022-05-23 . en-US.
  30. Web site: Greenberger . Alex . 2019-01-31 . Ramiken Gallery Wins Armory Show's Inaugural Gramercy International Prize . 2022-05-23 . ARTnews.com . en-US.
  31. Web site: 2017-06-23 . Andra Ursuţa "The Man From The Internet" at Massimo De Carlo, Milan — Mousse Magazine and Publishing . 2022-05-23 . www.moussemagazine.it . en-US.
  32. Web site: Alessandra Pioselli on Giorgio Andreotta Calò/Andra Ursuta . 2022-03-30 . www.artforum.com . en-US.
  33. Web site: 2022-03-30 . Exhibition '20/20' at David Zwirner, 20th Street, New York, USA . 2022-03-30 . ocula.com . en.
  34. Web site: 2022-02-02 . Biennale Arte 2022 Artists . 2022-03-30 . La Biennale di Venezia . en.
  35. Web site: Greenberger . Maximilíano Durón,Alex . Durón . Maximilíano . Greenberger . Alex . 2022-02-04 . The Venice Biennale By the Numbers: From an Unprecedented Number of Women to an Emphasis on the 20th-Century Avant-Garde . 2022-03-30 . ARTnews.com . en-US.
  36. Web site: 2022-05-23 . Exhibition '20/20' at David Zwirner, 20th Street, New York, USA . 2022-05-23 . ocula.com . en.
  37. Web site: Vessels David Zwirner Galleries Frieze . 2022-05-23 . www.frieze.com.
  38. Web site: Greenberger . Maximilíano Durón,Alex . Durón . Maximilíano . Greenberger . Alex . 2022-02-04 . The Venice Biennale By the Numbers: From an Unprecedented Number of Women to an Emphasis on the 20th-Century Avant-Garde . 2022-05-23 . ARTnews.com . en-US.

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