Lehmann Maupin is pleased to present Rise and Fall, an immersive installation of recent works by Teresita Fernández. For the artist’s second Hong Kong exhibition, Fernández will debut 24 solid graphite and pencil landscapes as an immersive installation. The relief panels, depicting the rise and fall of the tide and shifting horizon lines, are densely arranged on graphite-colored walls where Fernández has extended the blue-hued images by drawing directly on the wall surface. The result is a site-specific installation with thousands of blue horizon lines that rise and fall, surrounding the viewer. The title of the show, Rise and Fall, is also a reference to how this term is used to describe the rhythm and swinging pendulum of power and social movements throughout history. The gallery will host an opening reception for the artist on Thursday, October 26, from 6 – 8 PM at the Pedder Building.

Fernández has long questioned the traditional genre of landscape through abstracted interpretations of the land where history and materials mined from the ground are layered, becoming what she refers to as “stacked landscapes” that suggest being in more than one place at one time. Fernández often uses materials physically extracted from the topography they depict, creating experiential environments that disorient and complicate the idea of place by asking viewers to locate themselves both physically, historically, and metaphorically within the works. Large-scale projects such as her monumental Fata Morgana (2015) in New York City’s Madison Square Park, composed of a mirrored canopy that reflected and refracted the tens of thousands of pedestrians who traveled daily beneath the suspended artwork, demonstrate her unique approach to the genre. Fernández explains: “I’m interested in the idea that you are an extension of the landscape, that you are a part of it and it is a part of you. You look at the landscape, but it also looks back at you.”