Ernesto Neto Cai Cai Marrom 2007
© Ernesto Neto. Courtesy the artist and Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York / Los Angeles. Photo: Jean Vong
Brazilian sculptor Ernesto Neto is widely known for his sculptures and environments made from Lycra in combination with a variety of other materials, including herbs, styrofoam, and glass beads. Presenting sculpture as a sensual experience, Neto positions the visitor as stimulus receptor, appealing to his audience’s sense of touch as much as vision. In this regard, he is heir to a Brazilian artistic current that traces its roots to the Neo-Concrete works of Lygia Clark and Hélio Oiticica from the 1960s. Neo-Concretism rejected modernism’s ideas of autonomous geometric abstraction. Instead, they wanted to equate art with living organisms in a kind of organic architecture, and invite the viewer to be an active participant.
Cai Cai Marrom is composed of dark Lycra with a wooden interior structure. Hanging from a single point in the ceiling, this work supports dozens of appendages, each of which contains a variety of aromatic spices that provide form, color, and smell. Cai Cai Marrom is more of a free-standing sculpture than many of Neto’s more installation-oriented works; nevertheless, its aromatic nature ensures that it has an impact beyond its physical bounds.
Identification
Title
Cai Cai Marrom
Production Date
2007
Object Number
2011.01
Credit Line
Collection Pérez Art Museum Miami, museum purchase with funds provided by PAMM’s Collectors Council
Copyright
© Ernesto Neto. Courtesy the artist and Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York / Los Angeles. Photo: Jean Vong
https://www.pamm.org/en/artwork/2011.01
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Physical Qualities
Medium
Polyamide, wood, and spices
Dimensions
196 3/4 x 118 x 118 inches
Visual Description
Cai Cai Marrom by Ernesto Neto is a large installation piece made of Polyamide, wood, and spices. it measures 196 ¾ inches by 118 inches by 118 inches.
Imagine a cone like structure almost like the roof of a hut yet the frame is not circular. The frame of this structure is constructed of wood and shaped as an octagon. The frame is covered with stretched Lycra, dangling from a rope, hanging from the ceiling. The rope seems to be braided or knotted at the top, the narrow tip of the cone is pointed up and the wooden beam weighs the structure down.
There are round openings on top all around the circumference of the circular roof top, free floating structure. From the Lycra hang long drops of Lycra ending in round closed tube like formations. These elongated drops hang from all around the circular structure and are suspended a few feet above the ground depending on the site located.
These dozens of long tentacles that hang from the Lycra weighing it down forming a steep slope. The tentacles dangling from the rim are brown as well as the ones on the outer edge. The rim is a wooden structure suspended and coated in Lycra.
At the center formation of a few drop-like tentacles are colored yellow. Yet all coated with the brown stretched meshed Lycra gives a neutral tone all around. These Lycra droplet formations are spaced out a foot or so from each other. This spacing allows room for a person to walk through comfortably under what essential can be taken for an umbrella suspended in air. The drops are equally as long as the peak of the tied tip top of this suspended piece positioning the rim at horizontal center of composition. Each drop contains a mixture of scents and aromas
The drops are equally as long as the peak of the tied tip top of this suspended piece positioning the rim at horizontal center of composition.
