Dissipation

Occupying a space of poetic tension, Mercedes Mangrané's work meticulously investigates forces of impact and absorption, rigidity and fragility. Her exhibition, Dissipation, presents small-format works that stem from a desire for proximity to the viewer, enabling a sensual and lingering engagement with a suspended moment of experience. Her works, often originating from a humble gesture, explore materiality in a state between lightness and density developing a dialectic between everyday occurrences and broader structural forces. Along with the interplay of form and formlessness they reflect on processes of change and transience. As Mangrané notes, "In the plasters, I pour everything fragile that still resists submission. In the plasters, I pour everything fragile that still resists submission. In some way, their life is grafted onto mine. There’s a somatism that I pour into the pieces, which helps me channel the intensity of my experiences with the world and its violence.” Works that appear soft and flaccid are, in fact, rigid and hard. Despite a crushed appearance, they retain a pulse of colour that filters through them and lingers. This exploration was sparked during a residency in the French Prealps, where her observation of rockfall containment nets—engineered to absorb kinetic energy—resonated with her artistic inquiry into how surfaces incorporate dynamics of impact. Mangrané’s diverse body of work uncovers the hidden links between art history and our everyday life. This is further explored in a parallel series of glazed ceramics, Filtration. These objects represent an appropriation of a form designed for grip and ascent. Her research, including conversations with a climbing wall routesetter, revealed a fascinating choreography of body memory and the vibration of colour used to stimulate concentration and appeal. These “holds” become static sculptures, dysfunctional “holds” that speak to the memory of movement and to a certain sense and ritual of finding balance. Through her sensitive handling of materials, Mangrané creates a quiet yet powerful meditation on absorption and resilience. Her works invite us to reflect on relational support, permeability, and how the traces of experience—like an epidermal relationship, the absorbed pigment in plaster—permanently shape the forms that hold them. Mangrané's exploration extends to the direct medium of watercolour on plaster, which can be seen in Dissipation X, a piece that captures the gesture of seepage and evaporation, leaving behind a fragile, fossilised record of dissipated energy. The exhibition continues its flow with a new, on-site intervention applied directly to the wall, presenting a large-scale, acquired format. For Mangrané, these works form a cohesive ecosystem of ideas, mapping a terrain where the macro scale of a shoreline and the micro-scale of a crack in plaster converge.