Thomas Hirschhorn and Roxy Paine: Selections from The Collection presented two important, large-scale installations from MOCA’s permanent collection.
Swiss artist Thomas Hirschorn’s Non-Lieux (2002) is a three-dimensional tableau made of “low” materials—cardboard, candle wax, packing tape, wood, glass, paper, lights, and an electric train. Its “landscape” comprises two cardboard towers pinned with flags proclaiming DEMOCRACY; a dripping wax mountain populated with cutout Afghani soldiers; billboards plastered with magazine photos of women and Catholic saints; and cleaning product packaging boxes. The densely allegorical construction examines the entanglement of Western empires, consumer capitalism, and religious sectarianism with bleak irony. Roxy Paine’s Weed Choked Garden (2005) has 13 different species of weeds encroaching on a crop of vegetables. Together, the installations highlighted a range of methods and interests in early-2000s landscape tableaux.