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Jorge Macchi at Alexander and Bonin is the Daily Pic by Blake Gopnik

Below the Curve

The Daily Pic: Jorge Macchi makes an I-beam go limp.

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(Photo Joerg Lohse, courtesy Alexander and Bonin, New York)
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A piece called “Pendulum” by the artist Jorge Macchi, and now in his solo show at Alexander and Bonin gallery in New York. I like how Macchi makes an I-beam do the one thing it is absolutely meant not to do: bend. Another crucial component: The cheap plastic stools that can only barely support the steel, and show slight signs of buckling that prove its weight. And yet the sight of a curved I-beam seems so unlikely that there’s always some suspicion that the piece is trompe-l’oeil.

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