With her ongoing work A Guide to Insults and Misanthropy (2004 and 2012), Maria Loboda plants a little garden which manifests bitter or sad feelings through the symbolic language of flowers of the Victorian era. The work changes continuously through her choice of flowers, running the gamut between boredom (onion flower) and anticipation (gooseberry), hatred (basil) and disdain (yellow carnation). Loboda considers language an artistic material amongst many others that, for her, also include botany. With its symbolic reading of flowers, this new edition of her work at MINI/Goethe-Institut Curatorial Residencies Ludlow 38 is a unique take on this year’s theme of translation. In putting together an ensemble that will grow and change on the street in front of the gallery, Loboda expands the exhibition and embellishes this small corner of Chinatown, transforming the usage of public space by taking care of it.

The garden opening will also see the presentation of Oh, Wilderness, Loboda’s first monograph on her work from the period of 2009 until 2012. Published by Sternberg Press (which will also publish the anthology of Ludlow 38’s 2012 curatorial residency), the book demonstrates the artist’s aesthetic equation between language and materiality as it works the other way around, translating materials expressive of weak semiotics into language. Through these same materials, nature is observed and read, now constituting a grammar, rigorously arbitrary, formal, and conventional. The book contains an interview between Loboda, Caterina Riva, and Isobel Harbison, which traces the artist’s work and context, as well as texts by Riva, Harbison, and Lars Bang Larsen on Loboda’s practice.

The artist will be present for the garden launch and the book presentation at MINI/Goethe-Institut Curatorial Residencies Ludlow 38. A Guide to Insults and Misanthropy will remain on view through July 29 during the gallery’s regular opening hours (Thursday to Sunday, 1-6pm).

Maria Loboda was born in Krakow, Poland, in 1979. She completed her studies in 2008 under Mark Leckey at the Städelschule in Frankfurt am Main. Loboda has received studio scholarships from the Kulturstiftung der Dresdner Bank, Institut Français/Ville de Paris Résidences Internationales aux Recollets, the Hessische Kulturstiftung, as well as the 2011 Edward Steichen Award, which includes a six-month residency at the International Studio and Curatorial Program (ISCP) in Brooklyn. Her work has been shown in various group and solo exhibitions at ICA, Palais de Tokyo, Bielefelder Kunstverein, Maisterravalbuena, and Galerie Schleicher+Lange, among others. Loboda is currently participating in dOCUMENTA 13 through September 16. She lives and works in New York and London.

Curated by Clara Meister

Garden opening and book launch: Friday, July 6, 6-8pm