Exhibition brings fully-functioning social sculptures to DePauw

More than simply a static work of art, the 2005 piece "Orta Water-Fluvial Intervention Unit" is a fully functioning low-cost water purification mechanism. Created by wife-husband duo Lucy and Jorge Orta, the piece is indicative of much of the Orta's work, a functioning machine and a work of art that focuses on 21st-century social issues such as climate change and environmental conditions. A comprehensive exhibition of the Ortas' work will be on display Feb. 6-May 10 at the DePauw University Peeler Art Center. (Courtesy photo by Gino Gabrieli)

The traveling exhibition, Lucy+Jorge Orta: "Food-Water-Life," will open Feb. 6 and continue through May 10, the Richard E. Peeler Art Center at DePauw University has announced.

It marks the first comprehensive exhibition of work by Lucy+Jorge Orta available to American museums, organized by the Tufts University Art Gallery, touring nationally through 2015.

The sculptures, drawings, installations and video by the Ortas, a French wife-husband duo, collectively explore major concerns that define the 21st century: Biodiversity, environmental conditions, climate change and exchange among peoples. At the same time, the work embodies the philosophy that steers their pioneering art practice, "the ethics of aesthetics."

As heirs to the practice of social sculpture, formulated by Joseph Beuys in the 1960s, the Ortas' works are relics of their own function -- beguiling assemblages that are the platform for the preparation of food, mechanisms that actually purify water, and elements created for a 2007 expedition to Antarctica that are part of an effort to amend the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The works in this exhibition are metaphors-in-action, constructions that perform the tasks of which they are emblematic.

The humorous, jerrybuilt contraptions are obviously not the most efficient means to purify, prepare and transport food and water, or to launch a worldwide humanitarian effort, but in their ability to actually function, albeit, awkwardly and haltingly, they gain power as works of art created to move us to awareness and action. The artists have created a unique visual language through which they tackle the major global issues affecting our lives and the precarious position of this planet.

Working in partnership since 2005, Lucy+Jorge Orta create, produce and assemble their artworks and large installations together with a team of artists, designers, architects and craftspeople. They stage on-location workshops, ephemeral interventions, residencies and master classes, which explore the crucial themes of the contemporary world: The community, autonomy, dwelling, migration, sustainable development and recycling.

Their work has been the focus of important survey exhibitions in major museums, including the Barbican Art Gallery, London; Modern Art Museum, Paris; Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney; Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam; Hangar Bicocca, Milan; as well as the Venice, Havana and Johannesburg Biennales.

The exhibition is provided with support from Arts Illiana; the Indiana Arts Commission, a state agency; and the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency. Additional funding was provided by the department of conflict studies, The Douglas I. and Ann U. Smith Endowed Fund for Ethics and DePauw's Public Occasions Committee.

Galleries at the Richard E. Peeler Art Center are open Monday-Friday from 10 a.m.-4 p.m.; Saturday 11 a.m.-5 p.m.; Sunday 1-5 p.m.; and are closed during university breaks and holidays.

For more information, persons may contact Craig Hadley, director and curator of exhibitions and university collections, at 658-6556.