Tulip - Virginia Overton

Hypermaremma officially launches its fifth edition on Saturday, April 8th, with artist Virginia Overton’s monumental sculptural work entitled Tulip.

Located at Orbetello’s Polveriera Guzman facing the lagoon, Tulip is a 6-metre-high concrete structure punctuated by constellations of pink glass ‘windows’. Arranged back-to back, three vertical segments made from pre-existing moulds typically used for the construction of large tunnels, open towards the skytaking on the form of a ‘tulip’. Presented for the first time at the 59th Venice Biennale as part of ‘The Milk of Dreams’, Tulip activates a new form of collaborationthat aims to share contemporary artistic practices in dialogue withthe Maremma landscape.

Virginia Overton’s work will interact with the historical architecture of the Polveriera Guzman: a building constructed during Spanish rule in 1692, by the Flemish architect Ferdinand De Grunembergh. Throughout history it was employed as a gunpowder store then remained closed to the public for an extended period oftime. It is currently the headquarters of the Orbetello Archaeological Museum, where Etruscan, Roman, and Mediaeval artefacts found in thesurrounding area are preserved to narrate the exploits of pastpopulations.

Virginia Overton was born in Nashville, Tennessee in 1971 andlives and works in New York. Her work, which includesinstallation, sculpture,and photography, is the result of her direct intuitive response to a specific space. From a process of research and exploration, she creates works that re-activate the viewer’s spatial and sensory experience with an elegant physicality. Infused with an ethos of economy, Overton employs everyday, elemental materials to engage with asite, its geographical location and history. Wooden planks, beams, metal, mud, sheetrock, and bricks–things commonly associatedwith construction work or farming–are cut, bent, stacked, andhammered into shape, often pushing the material to its physical limit. Evincing the power and sensory quality of their own textural materials, her sculptures and installations, through their new functionality, expose the energy and associations encapsulated within their parts.

Solo exhibitions include Frist Art Museum, Nashville (2022);Goldsmiths CCA, London (2022); White Cube Hong Kong(2020); Socrates Sculpture Park, New York (2018); Museum ofContemporary Art Tucson, Arizona (2017); Whitney Museum ofAmerican Art, New York (2016); The Aldrich Contemporary ArtMuseum, Ridgefield, Connecticut (2016); Museum of Contemporary Art, Miami (2014); Westfälischer Kunstverein,Münster, Germany (2013); Kunsthalle Bern, Switzerland (2013);The Power Station, Dallas, Texas (2013); and The Power House,Memphis, Tennessee (2007).Group exhibitions include 59thVenice Biennale (2022); The Ranch, Montauk, New York (2021);Hayward Gallery, London (2020); Front Triennial, Cleveland(2018); Museum of Contemporary Art, Detroit, Michigan (2017);and Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania(2016).

Her work is represented by White Cube, Bortolami Gallery, galerie Francesca Pia.

In collaboration with White Cube

Thanks to Bortolami Gallery and Galerie Francesca Pia

With the patronage of Comune di Orbetello