A Holocaust survivor, Alina Szapocznikow first exhibited in 1950 and represented her native Poland at the ’62 Venice Biennale. She died in Paris in 1973, but interest in her work continues unabated.
This modest but flawlessly presented exhibition features sculptures from the late ’60s and early ’70s. They eerily presage “post-human” theorizing and a general preoccupation with the body that marks much of the art from the last 20 years.
Using polyester resin and polyurethane foam, the artist cast parts of her own figure before adding other, more ephemeral elements, resulting in hybrid forms that seem to meld together. These “awkward objects,” as the artist dubbed them, often appear decayed and on the verge of toppling over.
There’s a strong flavor of Surrealism to Szapocznikow’s unnerving fragmentations, plus hints of ’70s punk as well as the “abject” aesthetic of the early ’90s. A set of illuminated lamps in the rear gallery is more striking still, vividly evoking the infusion of domestic space with barely controlled organic energies and frailties.