Known for dramatic sculptural installations that mirror and comment on the landscapes they are placed within - often heavily trafficked urban areas like pedestrian plazas - Serra’s Junction Cycle at Gagosian bursts with metaphorical possibility and towers with technical proficiency. Confined as it is within the cavernous gallery walls, the work’s full scale can only be imagined (or glimpsed in bird’s-eye view photos). Its twin curvilinear shapes feel like a pencil sketch that has been etched in stone, the space between them forming a path for visitors to walk through. As with any path, as you negotiate the sweeping waves of steel the color of rust (or coagulated blood), you are only aware of the shapes unfolding directly in front of you. The claustrophobia of dark, narrow passages gives way to wide sweeping arcs filled with light and space, the transition as seamless and natural as fading daylight or the changing of the seasons. The work’s power comes from its many tensions: the mutability of its details when examined closely against the uniformity of its larger form when seen from a distance, for example. Or the work’s ability to feel organic, while rendered in man-made materials-the ultimate tension that has been at the heart of Serra’s work for half a century.

Critical Mob