JOSE DÁVILA
LOS LÍMITES DE LO POSIBLE

XIII BIENAL DE LA HABANA, MALECÓN HABANERO, LA HABANA, CUBA
17 APRIL 2019 – 12 MAY 2019
For the third edition of Detrás del Muro in the context of the XIII Bienal de La Habana (2019), the Mexican artist Jose Dávila presents a large-scale sculptural intervention in the heart of the Malecón Habanero, an iconic waterfront area of the Cuban capital. This intervention comprises a series of sculptures executed with volumes made with recinto, a kind of volcanic rock, and raw sandstone boulders. The interaction between the perfect geometric shapes of the recinto volumes and the capricious forms of the unaltered boulders, reveals a relation of contrast which is an essential part of Dávila’s sculptural practice.
The works have been executed with construction materials that can easily blend into the urban grid of La Habana; the presence of these works aims to question the common usage of public space and to reproduce the diverse urban narratives that will surround the sculptural group. The possible uses and applications of these works arise in the same way they were made, through an inherently intuitive attitude.
Commissioned by XIII Bienal de La Habana.
LOS LÍMITES DE LO POSIBLE, 2019
Recinto stone and boulders

© Courtesy of the artist, Sean Kelly Gallery and Bienal de la Habana
© Images María Rincón

FEATURED ARTIST

JOSE DÁVILA
Jose Dávila (b. 1974 in Guadalajara, Mexico) studied architecture at the Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Occidente in Guadalajara, Mexico, however, he considers himself a self-taught artist, with an intuitive formation.

Jose Dávila’s work is a constant search for moments of shared reciprocity between contradictory elements. By means of a structural intuition, Dávila produces constructive situations in which tension and stillness, geometric order and random chaos, fragility and resistance, are fluctuating commonplaces for materials in continuous transformation.

Based on the specificity of the materials that he ...
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