THE VASTNESS of Milan’s Pirelli HangarBicocca, a monumental converted factory that for the past decade has functioned as one of the city’s most important sites for seeing art, more than suits the sculptures and videos of Bruce Nauman. The pioneering American artist, now 81, is the subject of a survey that explores his influence within the realm of conceptual art, with works that range from sculptural installations based on rooms and corridors, to bold, neon wall-based works that flash words.
Bruce Nauman: Neons, Corridors and Rooms, exhibition view at Pirelli HangarBicocca, Milan, 2022
© 2022 Bruce Nauman / SIAE
As an artist who established himself in the 1960s, Nauman always sought to make art that was open to possibilities. The exhibition at HangarBicocca includes his iconic 1968 video, Walk with Contrapposto, in which the artist can be seen walking up and down the length of a narrow corridor enacting a version of the pose known as contrapposto. The Italian term, meaning ‘counterpoise’, describes the way in which a figure stands with their weight shifted onto one foot, so that their shoulders twist in the other direction. Commonly used within sculpture and painting since the classical period in Ancient Greece, Nauman explores this technique through his own body over the duration of the nearly hour-long video.
Bruce Nauman: Neons, Corridors and Rooms, exhibition view at Pirelli HangarBicocca, Milan, 2022
© 2022 Bruce Nauman / SIAE
A major highlight of the show is the presentation of Nauman’s corridor structures, which the artist started to make in the late 1960s in order to challenge the viewer’s experience of moving within space. The very first corridor created by the artist, Performance Corridor (1969), is included here, which actually originated as a prop for Walk with Contrapposto. In subsequent corridors, displayed in the show, we can see Nauman developing this idea through the inclusion of other devices that help to manipulate the physical and emotional stance of the viewer.
Bruce Nauman: Neons, Corridors and Rooms, exhibition view at Pirelli HangarBicocca, Milan, 2022
© 2022 Bruce Nauman / SIAE
Mirrors and brightly-coloured fluorescent light feature in other corridor works, such as the magnetic Green Light Corridor (1970), in which a fluorescent green light floods a narrow (yet walkable) space that makes itself available between two 12- metre-long walls. In Corridor Installation with Mirror – San Jose Installation (Double Wedge Corridor with Mirror), also made in 1970, Nauman incorporates a mirror so that the visitor undergoes a level of disorientation as they try to make their way through.
Bruce Nauman: Neons, Corridors and Rooms, exhibition view at Pirelli HangarBicocca, Milan, 2022
© 2022 Bruce Nauman / SIAE
Bruce Nauman: Neons, Corridors and Rooms, exhibition view at Pirelli HangarBicocca, Milan, 2022
© 2022 Bruce Nauman / SIAE
The thirty works displayed at the Pirelli HangarBicocca also include more recent projects. A new reconfiguration of Nauman’s audio installation Raw Materials (2004), which was originally conceived for the Turbine Hall at Tate Modern in London, is presented in Milan as an outdoor installation. It’s fantastically effective. Walking around one side of the building, you hear several voices from speakers, which vary from straightforward chants by the artist (such as ‘OK OK OK’) to more cryptic narratives that describe psychological states of mind. In effect, the sound installation is like a corridor of sound, and just as haunting as Nauman’s architectural spaces.
by Derby Jones
Bruce Nauman: Neons, Corridors, Rooms is on display at Pirelli HangarBicocca until 26 February.