Erika Verzutti "Chopping Board"
Sheep, 2010, pen and acrylic on board, 21x29cm
This was the artist’s first solo exhibition at Misako & Rosen, who showed her last year along with another Brazilian artist—Tiago Carneiro da Cunha. Verzutti’s latest work is done in the spirit of inter-media experimentation. She explores familiar surfaces and unfamiliar pigments and, as she put it, “flirt(s) with painting” in her frameless drawings made on wood panels. The result is very interesting, as the works on view appear both spontaneous and carefully executed. There are only two sculptures in the show, just enough to remind of Verzutti’s roots in three-dimensional work, yet, her sculpting impulse is amply expressed through gauging and carving of wooden boards. She is sensitive to every little marking in their surface, sometimes drawing our attention to these by outlining them in ink or matt acrylic. And while Verzutti’s whimsical animals have little in common with Yukihiro Taguchi’s performative installations (see the entry below), both artists seem to be led by the materials they use, capitalizing on the potential of domestic objects, be it discarded furniture or chopping boards purchased in Tokyu Hands.
