- Dates: February 19–June 13, 2021
- Curator: Manuel Cirauqui
- Film & Video gallery (103)
From February 19 to June 13, 2021, the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao will be presenting Alex Reynolds. There is a Law, There is a Hand, There is a Song, the first exhibition of 2021 in the Film & Video gallery, a space that the Museum reserves for key works in video art, film, and the artistic languages associated with the moving image.
This time, three recent works by Alex Reynolds (b. 1978, Bilbao) will be featured. Reynolds is known for her constant exploration of our modes of relation and affection, especially in their manifestations through cinematic language. The work The Hand that Sings (2021), recently co-produced by the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, will be shown in an international premiere in the main gallery as part of this exhibition.
Created by Reynolds in collaboration with Swedish choreographer Alma Södeberg, The Hand that Sings builds a web of connecting gestures, voices, and images in time. These elements seem to mimic each other in open sequences and chain reactions: from the almost ritual-like extraction of oak bark in Extremadura during the annual cork harvest, to the act of peeling an orange before a small fire or the act of washing someone’s hand; from the tremor of leaves to the trembling of a voice, along with the flapping of a bird’s wings in the distance or again, the feedback loop between the performer’s chant and hand movements. Words in Spanish and English are traded on a rooftop as we get a glimpse of the Palace of Justice in the Brussels skyline. The Hand that Sings is an evocative, sensorial work that focuses on details and contemplation. Bodies, the landscape, and the camera act in reciprocal harmony.