Christie's and Siegfried Contemporary present Tropicana.
Anton Alvarez has invented several machines, one of which uses thread, pigment and glue to bind together materials such as scraps of wood and electrical cords to create objects that are seemingly a hybrid between furniture and sculpture. He is concerned with being a craftsman and an engineer and states that "when I'm designing the machines I can be very free." Alvarez embraces chance in the process which he continually revises but believes that the machines are "like an extension of me... It is a machine, but it is almost like a brushstroke." He created a second machine which is called the Extruder and consists of a large metal cylinder supported by a metal base that contorts clay into shapes by applying pressure to the wet material, squeezing it out into shapes.
Jonathan Trayte's approach to making sculpture and installation is informed by our global language of consumption and the manipulation of consumer decision-making. Using a wide range of materials, methods and processes, his work reinterprets modern consumer behaviour and explores the psychology of desire through surface, material, light and colour. From processed meats and melons to giant gourds and exotic yams, Trayte often transforms organic objects into cast and painted bronze. Once assembled and delicately stacked in precarious arrangements, the work is then coated in meticulously painted layers. It is a coming together of natural forms and saccharine colours. Glossy synthetic skins of paint give the work a colourful pop status, a chameleon appearance and an almost edible quality.