Gordon Matta-Clark & Pope L.: Impossible Failures

Gordon Matta-Clark & Pope L.: Impossible Failures brings together two artists who explore their shared fixation on the challenges of architecture, language, institutions, scale, and value.

"[The exhibition is] powerful and unhinged and overbuilt—a monument to the entropy of the postindustrial city, and the tenuous dance of its inhabitants." — The New York Times

Gordon Matta-Clark and Pope.L are renowned for their interdisciplinary practices that scrutinise the value and paradoxes of urban life and the risks inherent in art making. By employing performance, film, drawing, and various multimedia projects, these artists often create interstitial spaces through sweeping gestures that consider shifting, decentralised zones. Grounded in the concept of failure, the sixth exhibition at 52 Walker and its accompanying catalogue rethink societal, artistic, and structural failures, offering a contemplation of hope in their expression.

With an introduction by curator and director of 52 Walker, Ebony L. Haynes, this publication includes a conversation piece between Haynes, artist Pope.L, and LAXART director Hamza Walker. They discuss the visual, material, and conceptual similarities between Pope.L's and Gordon Matta-Clark's works, and the significance of recognising the possibilities of failure as an artistic medium.

About Clarion

The Clarion series of illustrated publications extends each exhibition at the innovative gallery space 52 Walker, curated by Ebony L. Haynes. The programme focuses on showcasing conceptual and research-based artists from diverse backgrounds at various career stages. The series title is inspired by the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers' Workshop at the University of California, San Diego, attended by Octavia Butler in the 1970s. Butler's writing has significantly influenced the conceptual framework of the programme and the Clarion series. Featuring a sleek design inspired by encyclopedias, each publication includes colour reproductions of the featured works, an introduction by Haynes, commissioned essays, artist texts, archival materials, and more.