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Presa, 2009-2010



              
                 The work Presa brings in its “body” an elephant tusk – the ivory, a hard, yellowish-white and opaque organic material, which is the mass of this animal's canines, once used in the manufacture of piano keys and other items. The search for an elephant tusk took place during visits to antique shops and bric-a -brac fairs.

                 In parallel with this research, I developed a series of drawings to arrive at the solid metal and acrylic structure on which the tusk is supported. The initial idea was for this structure to be as discreet as possible, to almost disappear given its transparency and simplicity, and to allow something like the “floating” of the prey depending on the distance the observer takes from the work. A type of self-supporting solid acrylic billet was constructed to accommodate the prey.

                 The prey should be presented loosely, discreetly on the structure, without the protection of a dome or display case, as a kind of gift or offering, evoking the “precious” and “rarity” character of this object. In the opposite sense, there is also a sensorial appeal in this work, an erotic allegory, and an “aura” of fetish evidenced, above all, in the metal ring that surrounds it, whose design evokes a projectile.
                 In Presa there is a meeting of a quartet of elements that suggest perforations: the animal “canine” itself, a ring, a “projectile” and the asterisk-shaped metal structure that supports all the others.

                 The work Presa, appearing almost like a rare object, offers the visitor a combination of hollow or blunt elements that permeate each other. The “pedestal” in solid transparent acrylic suggests a reliquary, something on the order of the forbidden. In this sense, the ambivalent movement of approach and separation, of attraction and repulsion, are evident.

Thiago Honório, 2010.