JAUME PLENSA: WHISPER
April 23 - May 28, 1999

Richard Gray Gallery (located in the John Hancock Center, at 875 N. Michigan Avenue, Suite 2503, Chicago) presents Whisper, an exhibition of new sculptural work by Jaume Plensa on display from April 23 through May 28, 1999. There will be an exhibition preview and reception for the artist on Friday, April 23rd, from 5:30 - 8:00 PM. At 6:30, in the gallery, the artist will speak about his recent public projects. The event is open to the public. A large outdoor sculpture by the artist will also be on display at "Sculpture Walk" on Navy Pier, beginning May 5th.

Jaume Plensa was born in 1955, in Barcelona. Whisper will be his second exhibit at Richard Gray Gallery. With recent solo museum exhibitions at the Royal Scottish Academy in Edinburgh, the Joan Miro Foundation in Barcelona, the Galerie Nationale de Jeu de Paume in Paris, the Stadtische Kunstalle in Mannheim, the Palais Lichetenstein in Vienna, and the Kestner Gesellschaft in Hannover. Plensa has captivated European audiences with his enigmatic conceptual sculpture.

Carsten Ahrens, curator of the recent exhibition of Plensa's work in Hannover, Germany poses the question what is sculpture? In what ways can the fundamental experience of life be compacted into sculptural form? Jaume Plensa draws these questions together and pits one against the other in Whisper!

Sound plays an important role in this new body of work and the exhibition includes several gongs, which invite the viewer to interact.

"Silence is desire, a dream, an aspiration, something so unknown and so inaccessible that we can only imagine it... Our silence is noise. Noise is the only bridge between sound and silence, between what we know and what we wish. As soon as all is quiet, when we think we have achieved silence, we discover that something interrupts, something as close and familiar as our own body. Our noisy body...
I invite you to listen to these noises. I invite you to imagine the slience." (Jaume Plensa, Paris, May 20, 1997)