Alexandre da Cunha

Public voting is now open for Alexandre da Cunha’s monumental, kinetic sculpture, which was commissioned for London Underground’s new tube station at Battersea Power Station. The work has been nominated for the Public Statues and Sculpture Association’s 2022 Marsh Award for Public Sculpture.

Sunset, Sunrise, Sunset stretches over 150m in length, and was made using an outdated advertising mechanism – the rotating billboard.

The artwork was inspired by the former control room at Battersea Power Station and its system of vertical bars that regulated the production and output of electricity into the city. Bringing these resonances together with the daily flow of dawn to dusk, ‘Sunset, Sunrise, Sunset’ refers to cycles, routine, the everyday and eternity.

Voting closes on 17 November. Please click here to vote.

To view the work, visit Battersea Power Station Tube Station, Battersea Park Road, London. The station is open daily.

Tomorrow, 25 May at 12:30pm (London time) Alexandre da Cunha will be live from his studio with Ben Roberts (Artistic Director @brightoncca) for the launch of a new series, Process and Practice. 

For the inaugural presentation Brighton CCA invite you to an informal conversation with Alexandre about his practice, working during lockdown and upcoming projects, as he prepares for a major new exhibition of work opening at Brighton CCA on 6 August 2021. 

The conversation will be broadcast live on Zoom with the opportunity for questions at the end, however spaces are limited and booking is essential.

Process and Practice is a series of informal presentations with artists focusing on what they’re working on right now.

Click here to book

Alexandre da Cunha: 'Duplex,' Brighton CCA, Brighton, England

Exhbition dates: 6 August - 2 October 2021

Brighton CCA is pleased to present Duplex an exhibition of new works by Brazilian artist Alexandre da Cunha curated in collaboration with Jenni Lomax. This is the artist’s first solo presentation in a UK public institution for 10 years.

Duplex is an articulation of da Cunha’s engagement with cultures of consumption, reuse, materiality and art history. Central to da Cunha’s practice is the ready-made and specifically, how perceptions of objects are affected by place, time and the results of labour. Da Cunha’s complex and subtle process of transforming materials and images create encounters with everyday objects that disentangle the instinctive responses inherent to particular materials, endowing the works with alternative modes of understanding; so cotton becomes marble, mops become tapestry, construction tools become mysterious relics and mundane objects echo art historical precedents. The result is a vibrant dialogue about the history and function of symbols and material in society, from park benches and umbrellas to cement mixers and beach towels.

The presentation echoes the form of a processional route through the galleries, so visitors encounter objects and motifs presented and revisited much as the artist approaches objects and materials in his work. In this respect the exhibition speaks to its location; resonating with connections to a familiar past. Visible from the gallery windows is Brighton’s North Gate, a stone arch built for the royal procession to pass through at the opening of the Brighton Pavilion, while each year the Brighton Pride march – the largest in country – also passes in front of the gallery windows. Duplex engages with these histories as movements through time and culture of the city; reappropriating old signifiers and embracing a more contingent, yet confident present.

In June, as a precursor to Duplex, da Cunha will launch Brighton CCA’s inaugural Summer Commission, with a public artwork that will be on display until August. This is will be the first artwork in a series of annual temporary public commissions by invited artists to be held each summer.

Frieze Viewing Room

At the Fair

Thomas Dane Gallery

Featuring works by: Hurvin Anderson, Cecily Brown, Alexandre da Cunha, Anthea Hamilton, Phillip King, Michael Landy, Bob Law and Caragh Thuring.

Preview: 7-8 October 2020

Public access: 9-16 October 2020 

Further information

Alexandre da Cunha: Figurehead II, The Box, Plymouth

As part of a presentation of works, Alexandre da Cunha exhibits a new totemic sculpture from his Figurehead series, specially commissioned by The Box. In addition, a series of small table works populate the first floor in the North Hall — these playful sculptures are presented amongst objects and artefacts that da Cunha has chosen from The Box collections, creating a dialogue that explores domestic and leisure activity through thematic and material relationships. 

Finally, da Cunha's Affairs series occupies the South Hall and Active Archive; a collection of beach towels bearing national flags and consumer insignia, which explores his interest in stereotypes propagated under the guise of national identity.

Further information

Cecily Brown: Artists on Artworks, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Cecily Brown will be in conversation with Sheena Wagstaff, Leonard A. Lauder Chairman, Modern and Contemporary Art, The Met, to discuss the influential work of Gerhard Richter. 

Tuesday, 21 July, 6pm EDT

Further information 

Art Basel Online Viewing Room

Outdoor Sculptures & Commissions 

Thomas Dane Gallery presents work by artists who are challenging the meaning and emphasis of producing sculpture in the public realm.

Featuring works by: Lynda Benglis, Walead Beshty, Alexandre da Cunha, Anya Gallaccio, Anthea Hamilton, Arturo Herrera, Phillip King and Jean-Luc Moulène. 

Preview: 17 June, 1pm CET through 19 June, 1pm CET

Public Days:  19-26 June 2020 

Further information 

Gallery Reopening

Abraham Cruzvillegas, Alexandre da Cunha: Firstsite Activity Pack 2

Firstsite’s second artist created activity packs features contributions from Abraham Cruzvillegas and Alexandre da Cunha. ‘Art is where the home is’ will give you ideas about how to get creative at home. Anyone can have a go – there are no specialist materials required and it is free to download here.

Further information

Alexandre da Cunha: 'Sunset, Sunrise, Sunset', Art on the Underground 

Art on the Underground have commissioned Alexandre da Cunha to create a permanent artwork for the Northern Line Extension. Due to open in autumn 2021, the work will be installed at the new Underground station at Battersea Power Station. ‘Sunset, Sunrise, Sunset’ is a monumental kinetic sculpture reflecting on daily cycles. Da Cunha uses an outdated advertising mechanism - the rotating billboard - to create two friezes which will face each other along the length of the ticket hall, stretching nearly 100m in length.⁣
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Throughout the day, the panels will rotate, presenting different colour combinations into the ticket hall. The colours themselves are extracted from photos of London sunsets and sunrises, their rotation creating an ever-changing environment. 

Further information

Alexandre da Cunha: Book Launch, Thomas Dane Gallery, London

Please join us on the evening of Thursday 5 September for the launch of Monumento, co-published by Revolver Publishing and Cobogó. 

Monumento is the second publication dedicated to the work of Alexandre da Cunha. Da Cunha's practice is predominantly based on ideas of the readymade and found objects which he re-signifies, inviting viewers to see them with a new perspective. In recent years, Da Cunha has taken these ideas to a monumental scale, with commissions of public site-specific works in Boston, London, and São Paulo as well as other large outdoor works in US, Europe and South America. These large-scale installations constitute the core of Monumento. The book also showcases a series of smaller table sculptures, as well as a selection of Samplings, a series of works on paper which flirt with notions of collage, appropriation and the public realm. Monumento includes an essay by Fernanda Brenner and a conversation between Da Cunha, Phillip King and Jenni Lomax; the book is designed by GUNMAD and edited by Maria M. P. de Pontes. 

Thursday, 5 September, 6-8pm
Thomas Dane Gallery
3 Duke Street, St James's
London

Monumeto will also launch at:

Pivô 
Edifício Copan
loja 54 – Avenida Ipiranga, 200.
São Paulo
Saturday, 31 August

WIELS - Art Book Fair 2019
Avenue Van Volxem 354
1190 Forest
Belgium
Saturday, 7 September

Master Class: Alexandre da Cunha 

Alexandre da Cunha discusses his practice, in which he transforms everyday or found objects into sculpture and wall-mounted works that are grounded in a material aesthetic and ethic. Influenced by both systems of mass production and artisanal craftsmanship, the objects he creates appear to be a mix between popular consumer object and archaeological relic.

This talk is part of the Testing Ground: Master Class programme, a week long intensive with leading international artists sharing their expertise with a small group of emerging artists from around the country. Each of the artists, in addition to working with the emerging artists, will present a free evening lecture to the public about their work.

Zabludowicz Collection

176 Prince of Wales Road
London
NW5 3PT

Thursday, 31 January 2019 

7-9pm

Further information 

Alexandre da Cunha and Phillip King
Duologue

Royal Society of Sculptors, London
27 September - 2 December, 2018
Private view: 26 September, 6:30-8:30pm

Prior to the opening of the exhibition, Alexandre da Cunha and Phillip King will share a week of practical exchange at the Royal Society of Sculptors' studio space. Both artists will bring objects, materials and equipment, and between them explore the process of making. For the opening of the exhibition the studio space will be left as it is, with the remnants of the exchange on view.

In addition, a substantial group of smaller table-based works and maquettes by both artists will be on display illustrating the artists' diverse approach to object making. On the Sculpture Terrace, da Cunha will exhibit a new monumental outdoor work.

Further information

Alexandre da Cunha and Phillip King in conversation with Jenni Lomax
9 October, 6:30-7:30 pm

The artists will also be in conversation with Jenni Lomax, discussing how the collaboration opened up a dialogue about their work and between their individual practices.

Book tickets

Voyage at Bergamin & Gomide, São Paulo

Curated by Alexandre da Cunha

15 November, 2017 - 20 January, 2018

Further information

Alexandre da Cunha: Plaza (Arcade), 2017

 Boston, Autumn 2017

Plaza (Arcade): a new monumental public sculpture by Alexandre da Cunha; commissioned by Samuels & Associates, and to be installed in a new public square in Fenway, Boston.

This will be da Cunha's first permanent public project in the United States. It joins significant public projects by the artist in the United Kingdom and Brazil. 

The work consists of three industrial concrete rings, reminiscent of ready-made, large-scale subterraneous, civic drainage pipes, placed around the public square. The rings resemble urban furniture, ancient celestial clocks or even mysterious astronomic measuring devices.

Plaza (Arcade), 2017 will be unveiled at a ceremony on 24th September 2017.

For more information contact Tom Dingle: tom@thomasdanegallery.com

Alexandre da Cunha: Boom

Pivô, São Paulo

1 April - 10 June, 2017

Further information

Hallstatt

 Group exhibition at Fortes D'Aloia & Gabriel Galeria, São Paulo

Curated by Maria do Carmo M.P. de Pontes and Kiki Mazzucchelli

10 December, 2016 - 10 February, 2017

Further information

Alexandre da Cunha: Mix (Americana)

Laumeier Sculpture Park, Missouri

Mix (Americana) is installed at Laumeier Sculpture Park in Missouri to mark their 40th anniversary year. It is a full-scale cement mixer, polished and painted in a patriotic red, white and blue. The sculpture has been stripped of its mixing duty on the back of a truck and staged instead as a functional sundial. 

Further information

Making & Unmaking: An exhbition curated by Duro Olowu

Camden Arts Centre, London

19 June - 18 September, 2016

Making & Unmaking, curated by celebrated fashion designer and curator Duro Olowu. The exhibition brings together over sixty international artists working in diverse media, including Hurvin Anderson, Walead Beshty, Alexandre da Cunha and Anya Gallaccio.

Further information

Alexandre da Cunha: Mix II 

Rochaverá Corporate Towers

Mix II is Alexandre da Cunha’s first large scale public commission in Sao Paulo. Made using the drum of a concrete mixer truck and cast concrete - objects traditionally used in the production of public buildings - they now become objects to be looked at for their own form. These materials are especially significant in Brazil and to Da Cunha where concrete has played such a significant role both in art and architecture. 

Da Cunha has described his practice not as ‘making’ but as ‘pointing’. Pointing at existing objects in our everyday surroundings, and highlighting or revealing new and unexpected facets or meanings within them. 

British Art Show 8

October 9, 2015 - January 10, 2016

Leeds Art Gallery

Further information

Alexandre da Cunha: MCA Chicago Plaza Project

July 18, 2015 - July 24, 2016

Museum of Contemporay Art Chicago

Further information

Drawing Room Confessions presents: Issue #9 Bruce McLean, Issue #10 Alexandre da Cunha and Issue #11 Richard Wentworth.

A Book Launch.

Wednesday, 15 April, 7-8pm

David Roberts Art Foundation

Symes Mews

London NW1 7JE

Further information

The 2013 edition of the Contemporary Art Festival celebrates an important moment for the biennial show. The main Brazilian event dedicated to the artistic production from the geopolitical South (Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa, Middle East, Eastern Europe, South and Southeast Asia and Oceania) goes thirty. It is the only Brazilian international festival for contemporary art, with exhibitions, public activities, awards. As in previous editions, a major exhibition establishes a dialogue with the Southern circuit: besides the Southern Panoramas competitive show, this year the highlight is the three decades of experimentation and risk assumed by Videobrasil since 1983, brought together in the exhibition 30 Years.

The Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris is highlighting the art of textiles with the exhibition Decorum. This exhibition will feature over a hundred rugs and tapestries created by modern (Francis Bacon, Pablo Picasso) as well as contemporary artists (Dewar & Gicquel, Vidya Gastaldon). 

Decorum is a chance to discover the often unknown ventures into weaving by both major artists of the twentieth century, as well as lesser known artists (such as Guidette Carbonell). The exhibition also includes anonymous works from different time periods and regions in order to underscore meaningful similarities and differences.

The virtues of carpets and tapestries are numerous: visual and tactile, artistic and functional, they are also readily transportable (Le Corbusier qualified the tapestries as 'Muralnomad'). They transcend the usual limitations of decorative arts and interior design.

Until the late 19th century, painters like Lotto, Holbein and Delacroix restricted themselves to drawing tapestry cartoons or including Oriental carpets in their pictures. Over the course of the 20th century, however, the European avant-garde revolutionized textile art and practice; artists began weaving their own rugs, inspired by works from earlier periods or drawing upon ethnic and geometric motifs. 

Since the 1960s, carpets and tapestries often bear a political or feminist message.  Beginning with the new millennium, they have grown in popularity. Young contemporary artists like Caroline Achaintre and Pae White are now producing original works that blend tradition, non-Western influences and modernity, for instance through the use of innovative techniques such as digital weaving.

This exhibition challenges the preconceived notion of tapestry as a minor or anachronistic art form. The exhibition also recalls a little known aspect of the history of the MAM that had its own Textile Art department in the 1980s.

As guest artistic director, theLondonbased artist Marc Camille Chaimowicz has designed the exhibition in collaboration with architect Christine Ilex Beinemeier. The ambient music (“furnishing music”) serving as the exhibition’s audio backdrop is a playlist proposed by aesthetic lecturer Jean-Philippe Antoine.

The richly illustrated catalogue is co-published with Skira-Flammarion (with graphic design by Huz&Bosshard).

Curated by Simon Faithfull and Ben Roberts, 'The World Turned Upside Down' places the work of over twenty international artists working in film, sculpture, installation art and performance in direct relation to Buster Keaton's films to track a lineage from the melancholic and at times anarchic comedy of Keaton to the dry wit of conceptual practice.

By examining Keaton's approach to art through making - the processes of failure, risk and repetition - the exhibition also establishes a nuanced presentation of the developmental relationship between slapstick film, sculpture and performance and highlights parallels within modern and contemporary sculptural practice which continue to resonate today.

The exhibition features work of conceptual artists working in film, photography, sculpture, installation art and performance; by historical and contemporary, established and emerging artists. These include Bas Jan Ader, Angus Braithwaite and Fred Lindberg, Marcel Broodthaers, Alexandre da Cunha, Simon Faithfull, Peter Fischli David Weiss, Brian Griffiths, Jeppe Hein, Sofia Hulten, William Hunt, Tehching Hsieh, Hayley Newman, Roman Signer, Richard Wentworth, Richard Wilson, John Wood and Paul Harrison.

'The World Turned Upside Down' is a Mead Gallery exhibition which has been supported by The Henry Moore Foundation.

Homebodies presents work by contemporary artists who examine the space of the home, both literally and metaphorically, as an integral site for making art. Featuring an expansive range of artworks, some made of materials found in the domestic sphere and others that represent or re-create a sense of domesticity, Homebodies demonstrates a new understanding of how the domestic context has influenced the creation and interpretation of contemporary art. The exhibition incorporates various media, including paintings by Hurvin Anderson; sculptures by George Segal and Rachel Whiteread; installations by Alexandre da Cunha and Do Ho Suh; photography by Marina Abramović, Barbara Kruger, Doug Aitken, and Adrian Piper; video by Martha Rosler, Rivane Neuenschwander, and Guy Ben-Ner; and a living-room environment by Dzine that doubles as a nail salon. The exhibition is likewise international in its reach, drawing from six continents to include more than forty artists at various stages in their careers.

The domestic setting has been a crucial site (and recurring subject) of artistic production-a parallel track and occasionally a counterpoint to more commonly celebrated contexts such as the artist's studio and the public sphere. In fact, many artists, for personal or financial reasons, work at home, and for those artists the home often becomes the subject and source of their artwork. Although this exhibition focuses on artists working from the late 1960s to the present, there are notable precedents in art history dating back as early modernism. Major artists in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, including Vincent van Gogh and Henri Matisse, frequently depicted domestic interiors as sites of psychological reflection and a potent metaphor for social or historical concerns. Later, in the 1970s, the feminist movement exposed the home as a site of identity production and interrogation, putting pressure on the presumably male cliché of the heroic artist creating alone in his studio. In recent years, as commerce and communication have become increasingly globalized, artists have paradoxically turned inward, examining the idea of "home" in more localized contexts, recognizing it as an arena of social development and an indicator of economic trends, especially as more and more artists confront the recent crises in housing and urban development in their work.

The exhibition is organized in three sections. The first, Architectonics, includes works that represent interiors, use fragments of private homes, or are produced on a small scale, often using humble, domestic materials. The second section, Division of Labor, presents artworks that replicate a "cottage industry" scale of production or refigure activities such as care and cleaning, and demonstrates the lasting impact of the feminist movement on artists of any gender expression. Finally, the third section, Psychogeographies, considers how private interiors can become a metaphor for interior mental spaces, oftentimes fraught with anxiety and upheaval.

This exhibition is organized by Naomi Beckwith, Marilyn and Larry Fields Curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago.

Homebodies presents work by contemporary artists who examine the space of the home, both literally and metaphorically, as an integral site for making art. Featuring an expansive range of artworks, some made of materials found in the domestic sphere and others that represent or re-create a sense of domesticity, Homebodies demonstrates a new understanding of how the domestic context has influenced the creation and interpretation of contemporary art. The exhibition incorporates various media, including paintings by Hurvin Anderson; sculptures by George Segal and Rachel Whiteread; installations by Alexandre da Cunha and Do Ho Suh; photography by Marina Abramović, Barbara Kruger, Doug Aitken, and Adrian Piper; video by Martha Rosler, Rivane Neuenschwander, and Guy Ben-Ner; and a living-room environment by Dzine that doubles as a nail salon. The exhibition is likewise international in its reach, drawing from six continents to include more than forty artists at various stages in their careers.

The domestic setting has been a crucial site (and recurring subject) of artistic production-a parallel track and occasionally a counterpoint to more commonly celebrated contexts such as the artist's studio and the public sphere. In fact, many artists, for personal or financial reasons, work at home, and for those artists the home often becomes the subject and source of their artwork. Although this exhibition focuses on artists working from the late 1960s to the present, there are notable precedents in art history dating back as early modernism. Major artists in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, including Vincent van Gogh and Henri Matisse, frequently depicted domestic interiors as sites of psychological reflection and a potent metaphor for social or historical concerns. Later, in the 1970s, the feminist movement exposed the home as a site of identity production and interrogation, putting pressure on the presumably male cliché of the heroic artist creating alone in his studio. In recent years, as commerce and communication have become increasingly globalized, artists have paradoxically turned inward, examining the idea of "home" in more localized contexts, recognizing it as an arena of social development and an indicator of economic trends, especially as more and more artists confront the recent crises in housing and urban development in their work.

The exhibition is organized in three sections. The first, Architectonics, includes works that represent interiors, use fragments of private homes, or are produced on a small scale, often using humble, domestic materials. The second section, Division of Labor, presents artworks that replicate a "cottage industry" scale of production or refigure activities such as care and cleaning, and demonstrates the lasting impact of the feminist movement on artists of any gender expression. Finally, the third section, Psychogeographies, considers how private interiors can become a metaphor for interior mental spaces, oftentimes fraught with anxiety and upheaval.

This exhibition is organized by Naomi Beckwith, Marilyn and Larry Fields Curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago.

Participating artists:

Alexandre da Cunha
Michael Rey
Michael WIlliams
B.Wurtz

Garden of Reason was an exciting season of contemporary art held at Ham House and Garden over the Summer of 2012.

The 17th-century garden at Ham served as inspiration and setting for eight major commissions, ranging from sculpture to film, sound pieces and performance, as well as a series live art events. The exhibition was further animated by a series of talks and tours.

The project also offered the chance for Ham House and Garden to get involved with its local community, and the interaction programme worked with local groups to produce fantastic new interpretations of the garden and even organise a unique evening event in August.