Exhibitions
Samuel Salcedo or when sculpture forces you to hold your gaze
Salcedo's sculptures invite you to stop, look closely and discover the emotions and tensions that inhabit every gesture and every crease of the face, now at the Moco Museum.
The date of July 26 will mark the end of the opportunity to contemplate and dialogue with the legendary sculptures of Samuel Salcedo at the Moco Museum in Barcelona, an exhibition that has captivated both the local and international public for its emotional intensity and conceptual power.
In Salcedo's artistic practice, the human face becomes an emotional territory, a space of tension and revelation where identity, fragility and consciousness converge. His sculptures function as psychological mirrors, directly addressing the viewer and inviting them to recognize themselves in the contained, often ambiguous expressions that inhabit these silent bodies. Far from simple figurative representation, the Barcelona artist explores the face as a space of projection, a place where fears, contradictions, desires and universal moods are inscribed.
Through a sculptural language of almost disturbing precision, Salcedo captures the complexity of human expression by establishing a constant dialogue between presence and absence, between what is shown and what is intuited. His figures, suspended in an indefinite emotional moment, engage the viewer's perception and open a space for reflection on vulnerability as an essential condition of human existence.
Working with a wide variety of materials—ranging from smooth, almost translucent surfaces to rough, dense, and forceful textures—Salcedo gives each work a physical and emotional presence that demands time, silence, and careful observation. His sculptures are not exhausted by a quick glance: they beg to be contemplated, explored slowly, as if revealing themselves in layers.
Each piece is configured as a universe in itself, an intimate space where the gaze, the tension of the mouth or the subtle folds of the face construct a silent story. They are minimal gestures but loaded with meaning, suggesting emotions, thoughts and inner states impossible to translate into words, but deeply recognizable by those who approach them with sensitivity.
The three works present at the Moco Museum are Wrecking Ball I from 2015, Mirror Mirror on the Wall from 2025 and I'll be your mirror also from 2025. In Wrecking Ball I (2015), Samuel Salcedo works on the idea of presence based on mass and volume, encapsulating human faces with ambiguous expressions that force the viewer to a slow and introspective reading of the gesture and emotional weight that we project into space.
In Mirror Mirror on the Wall (2025), the face becomes an emotional mirror: no expression is neutral and each piece admits multiple interpretations depending on the observer's gaze, bringing into play empathy, discomfort and personal projection. Finally, I'll Be Your Mirror (2025) consolidates this metaphor of the mirror with a monumental face that returns a mutable emotional image, reminding us that looking at the work always implies looking at oneself.
