Roving Eye: Doris Salcedo at Tate Modern - The Show I Wish I had Seen

Today's posting is the first example of the Craig Scott Gallery Daily Blog drawing readers' attention to great artists who have no associations with the gallery (however much I wish they did!). My friend, Ana Maria Bejarano, first drew my attention to Doris Salcedo, and I have since followed her work online with fascination. Salcedo is from Colombia (where she lives, in Bogotá) and much of her work explores memory and the dark side of humanity at the intersection of sculpture, assemblage and (that catch-all) installation. But, of all the works I wish I had had a chance to see was her recently-ended Shibboleth exhibition in the huge Turbine Hall at London's Tate Modern. According to the Tate, it is is the first work to intervene directly in the fabric of the Turbine Hall. Says the Tate,

Rather than fill this iconic space with a conventional sculpture or installation, Salcedo has created a subterranean chasm that stretches the length of the Turbine Hall. The concrete walls of the crevice are ruptured by a steel mesh fence, creating a tension between these elements that resist yet depend on one another. By making the floor the principal focus of her project, Salcedo dramatically shifts our perception of the Turbine Hall’s architecture, subtly subverting its claims to monumentality and grandeur. Shibboleth asks questions about the interaction of sculpture and space, about architecture and the values it enshrines, and about the shaky ideological foundations on which Western notions of modernity are built.

Below is a still photo showing one perspective of the Shibboleth floor. Your guess is as good as mine how she accomplished this monumental feat -- and convinced the Tate to allow this kind of work (or did they have to convince her?). If you click on the video and images tabs on the Tate's splash page for the Salcedo exhibition, I hope you will experience the same sense of awe and appreciation I have each time I visit this page. I can only imagine what experiencing the work in person would have been like, as the exhibition closed April 6.