Part I: Nadie es de Aquí
rame CUEN
2019

A letter to friend and artist Eunice Choi who's contribution was contemplated to take place inside a fridge.

Subject: About the bricks in the fridge

Dear Eunice,

Before “a knife to carve a knife with”, my father had a sculpture made of bricks in the room. I took his solo exhibition titled "Nadie es de Aquí" no-one belongs here, as the departure point for our group exhibition. His bricks were previously flat on the floor like a tomb; laid in the shape of a Carl Andre work even though this wasn't his original reference. Rather his desire was to assemble a grave in which we stand and practice around. No-one's graves in particular, but someone/something who we —us who don't belong here— are in debt to.

For the rearrangement of the sculpture we both negotiated this debt. Instead of leaving it flat in the room as a reminder of itself, we ascend it into a vertical position, making it more obtrusive and more present, but also signifying repaying the debt —hence the shape of stairs— another Andre reference.

However, not all the bricks assembled neatly into the new thing, we were left with bricks that made the shape of the sculpture uneven, so we hid them in your fridge… I hope that's okay. Since the bricks represent debt, for us it was important that the same mass of the previous work remained in the same room..

Part II: A Knife to Carve a Knife With
2022

A Knife to Carve a Knife was a two-part exhibition at La Clínica that explored carving methodologies and matter.

The first chapter is Rame Cuen's cosmology, "Nobody is from Here." This body of work involves collecting heritages, assembling landscapes, and stretching the past. Engaging with heritage; sharpening it rather than cutting it. Objects, seeds, and photographs are placed in a space where no one owns anything, but everyone owes everything. The second chapter of this exhibition is set within this territory. Some of Rame's sculptures begin to fade while other objects emerge. An Ikea shelf, a stack of books, plants, a lamp, a sofa—each belonging to a participating artist.

Exhibition view; video work by Harry Dodge and stack of books from Liam Wilson