Laura Matei
Gian Carla Zanutti
For her first solo gallery show, Laura Matei, a young Romanian artist living in Italy, forged an unexpected union between canvas and sewing needles. Four white canvases hanging in a row tracked the progression, from left to right, of an acrobat walking a tightrope. The figure was “drawn” by passing black thread through the eyes of needles stuck through and protruding from the surface of the canvas.
Exact in its geometric conciseness, fascinating in its airy lightness, Funanbolo, 1999, is also ironic, since, while remaining almost disembodied, it presents itself as a kind of bas-relief. Matei has