Stefan Brüggemann’s new exhibition Dos Líneas (Fe) has just opened at the Museo Nacional de Arte (MUNAL), Mexico City.
The exhibition explores the themes of Power, Symbols, Religion and History and features Minimalism, Sacred Art, Muralism and Pre-Columbian Art. The artworks, crafted exclusively for this exhibition, are undeniably shaped by the museum’s rich context. As a custodian of significant works reflecting Mexican history spanning from the viceroyalty era to contemporary times, the museum has profoundly influenced the creative process. Immersing in the museum’s collection sparked an introspective voyage, ultimately inspiring the creation of the pieces currently showcased at MUNAL.
Brüggemann was able to delve deeply into his personal history for the exhibition, a history that has extraordinary parallels with Mexican cultural history. His father, a European, was a renowned archaeologist who, among many other projects, was responsible for the excavation of the archaeological remains of Tajín. His mother, a Mexican, worked on the excavations of the ancient Cathedral of Mexico, located just a few metres from the site of the museum. During this process of reflection, a particularly relevant memory came to the fore. As a child, when he first observed the phylacteries of religious paintings, he discovered that the painting could contain text. This revelation was to have a profound effect on his artistic production, as text has been the backbone of his entire art practice. Before concluding his introspection, he did not overlook the muralists, to whom he owed the social, political, and economic dimension of his works.
Brüggemann captures all this amalgam of legacies and ideas, embedded in his memory in the paintings that make up this exhibition. These are large canvases covered with gold leaf, some with silver, on which he paints simple spray-painted crosses. The large fields of gold and silver, together with the sprayed crosses, result in a kind of symbolic minimalism where, as in all his work, the viewer is overwhelmed by the questions the works raise. Although on this occasion he uses the symbol instead of the usual text to achieve this, the result is still the same invitation to reflection, far from positionalism and indoctrination.
Gold leaf and silver, recurrent in his recent work, are materials that allow Brüggemann to paint by reflection. They adapt perfectly to the surface on which they are applied, revealing every texture of the material itself and reflect- ing every little gesture of the artist in applying them. But his choice goes beyond the purely formal. Both materials have an important symbolic component relating to power, wealth or greed, but they are also materials with a long tradition in art history, alluding to Sacred Art, Ornamental Art or Mexican works of art such as those preserved in the MUNAL. However, Brüggemann’s use of them, extending them over the entire surface of his big canvases to form large monochrome fields, gives the paintings an almost industrial aesthetic, reminiscent of Minimalism. This clash of ideas and styles takes the viewer into the realm of amphibology and contradiction, where Brüggemann’s work achieves the desired dimension.
The choice of spray paint for the crosses, the central element of the works, is by no means accidental. Once again, it is a recurring material in Brüggemann’s practice. On this occasion, his choice takes on a particularly transcendent meaning, as spray paint is both a symbol of protest and a symbol of contemporary expression. The cross is perhaps the most recognisable, powerful and influential symbol in our history. Needless to say, its obvious connotations are well known to all. But if there is one thing that all of Brüggemann’s works have in common, it is that no element used, be it material, symbol or text, remains what it is at first glance or has only one interpretation, and this occasion is no exception. The crosses in his works are two simple sprayed lines that intersect, just as in Mexico two lineages, the indigenous and the Spanish, have intersected to form the country’s cultural heritage. With the title of the exhibition, which is shared by all the works in it: “Dos Líneas (Fe)” (Two Lines (Faith)), Brüggemann emphasises this idea and leads us to a profound reflection on Mexican cultural reality.
Stefan Brüggemann, Dos Líneas (Fe), 1st February – 26th May 2024, MUNAL, Mexico City
About the artist
Stefan Brüggemann’s artistic journey spans across sculpture, video, painting, and drawing, weaving together text in conceptual installations rich with incisive social commentary and a post-pop aesthetic. Hailing from Mexico City and actively working between Mexico, London, and Ibiza, Brüggemann’s body of work is distinguished by an ironic fusion of Conceptualism and Minimalism.
Unlike the conceptual artists of the 1960s and 1970s who aimed for dematerialization and rejected art’s commercialization, Brüggemann’s practice takes a different path. His aesthetic exudes refinement and luxury while retaining a punk ethos, positioning his work outside the traditional canon.
Central to Brüggemann’s practice is the philosophy of language, where text serves as a fluid medium, shaping both form and meaning. His choice of words is typically provocative, acerbic, and topical, demonstrating his mastery of wordplay and conceptual rigor. Through this, Brüggemann crafts a bold and relevant body of work that delves into themes of appropriation and displacement.
