About
As an artist you create a language, you create depth to a language, you change the language.
—Rachel Whiteread
Gagosian is pleased to present Internal Objects, an exhibition of new work by Rachel Whiteread.
Whiteread employs the formal language of Minimalism, taking cues from its emphasis on geometric seriality, yet adds a quietly emotive aspect, maintaining an acute sensitivity to objects’ minor details and subtle markers of use and human irregularity. Over the past four decades, she has used the method of casting on both “low” materials such as concrete, resin, rubber, and plaster, as well as more traditional sculptural materials, such as bronze. Whether they take the form of monumental public installations or small, intimate objects, Whiteread’s forms imply hidden narratives and secret histories. She employs existing artifacts and spaces—including domestic objects like chairs and mattresses, interiors of rooms, and even, famously, an entire terraced house—to evoke and explore corporeal presence. Notably, her deft use of negative space can imply a thing that’s gone and been reincarnated.
In this exhibition, this suggestion of haunting, or ghostliness, is manifested in a different way. In Detached 1, Detached 2, and Detached 3 (all 2012), which she installed at Gagosian London in 2013, Whiteread rendered the empty interiors of three garden sheds in concrete and steel. Now, in Internal Objects, she has again created cabin-like structures but has, for the first time, eschewed casting existing objects in favor of building original ones. Poltergeist (2020) and Döppelganger (2020–21), which will occupy the two main rooms of the Grosvenor Hill gallery, are made of found wood and metal that has been meticulously overpainted in white household paint.
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Rachel Whiteread: … And the Animals Were Sold
An installation by Rachel Whiteread in the Palazzo della Ragione, Bergamo, Italy, commissioned by Galleria d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Bergamo and cocurated by Lorenzo Giusti and Sara Fumagalli, opened in June of 2023 and ran into the fall. Conceived in relation to the city, the architecture of the site, and the history of the region, it comprised sixty sculptures made with local types of stone. Fumagalli writes on the exhibition and architect Luca Cipelletti speaks with Whiteread.
Now available
Gagosian Quarterly Winter 2022
The Winter 2022 issue of Gagosian Quarterly is now available, featuring Anna Weyant’s Two Eileens (2022) on its cover.
Rachel Whiteread: Shy Sculpture
On the occasion of the unveiling of her latest Shy Sculpture, in Kunisaki, Japan, Rachel Whiteread joined curator and art historian Fumio Nanjo for a conversation about this ongoing series.They address the origins of these sculptures and the details of each project.
Augurs of Spring
As spring approaches in the Northern Hemisphere, Sydney Stutterheim reflects on the iconography and symbolism of the season in art both past and present.
In Conversation
Tom Eccles and Kiki Smith on Rachel Whiteread
On the occasion of Artist Spotlight: Rachel Whiteread, curator Tom Eccles and artist Kiki Smith speak about the work of Rachel Whiteread through the lens of their personal friendships with her. They discuss her public projects from the early 1990s to the present, the relationship between drawing and sculpture in her practice, and the way her works reveal the memories embedded in familiar everyday objects.
In Conversation
Rachel Whiteread and Ann Gallagher
Rachel Whiteread speaks to Ann Gallagher about a new group of resin sculptures for an exhibition at Gagosian in London. They discuss the works’ emphasis on surface texture, light, and reflection.
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London Gallery Weekend
Damien Hirst and Rachel Whiteread
June 4–6, 2021
London
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As part of the inaugural London Gallery Weekend, Gagosian will have extended hours at all three London locations. Damien Hirst: Relics and Fly Paintings, the second exhibition of the artist’s yearlong takeover of the Britannia Street gallery, will be unveiled on June 5 to coincide with the event. Visitors can also see Rachel Whiteread: Internal Objects at Grosvenor Hill, alongside additional works by the artist at Davies Street, before it closes on June 6. London Gallery Weekend is a new and free annual event featuring over 140 of the city’s leading contemporary art galleries coming together to celebrate culture and creativity.
As part of the event, Gagosian is collaborating with the Connaught Patisserie for a special pop-up, which will be at Gagosian, Grosvenor Hill, on June 5 from 10am to 4pm and June 6 from 11am to 3pm.
Installation view, Rachel Whiteread: Internal Objects, Gagosian, Grosvenor Hill, London, April 12–June 6, 2021. Artwork © Rachel Whiteread. Photo: Prudence Cuming Associates