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03/09/13 Doris Salcedo, White Cube, London | Culture | The Guardian

www.theguardian.com/culture/2004/sep/15/1/print 1/4

Suppressed violence: Doris Salcedo, White Cu be, London

Photo: Stephen White

There is something wrong with the gallery. It should be wider and longer; the light

should bebrighter. Otherwise, it is all but empty. Paradoxically, Neither, by Columbian

artist Doris Salcedo, has been a massive undertaking. Embedded in the walls is a

diamond-pattern grid, from floor to ceiling, right around the gallery, a heavy-duty metal

mesh driven flush into the surface of the plaster. The walls press in, the references

multiply. This mesh, whose primary use is to strengthen concrete floors, has latterlyfound a more ignoble use: the cages at Guantnamo Bay.

In a couple of places - high on the wall close by a far corner, and from floor to waist

height on the opposite wall - the mesh is pulled free. There's more mesh behind. The

grille also protrudes over the entrance, as though the mesh, the walls and the space itself

have failed to reach an accord.

The walls are false, walls built within walls, one side of the mesh sharpened and pushed

into the plasterboard with an industrial hydraulic press. The business of making this

work has been rigorously mundane, and the atmosphere of suppressed violence is

palpable.

Art

Doris SalcedoWhite Cube, London

4 / 5

Adrian Searl e

The Guardian, Wednesday 1 5 September 2004 1 4.05 BST

http://www.theguardian.com/profile/adriansearlehttp://www.theguardian.com/profile/adriansearlehttp://www.theguardian.com/profile/adriansearlehttp://www.theguardian.com/ukhttp://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardianhttp://www.theguardian.com/profile/adriansearlehttp://www.theguardian.com/profile/adriansearlehttp://www.theguardian.com/uk

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03/09/13 Doris Salcedo, White Cube, London | Culture | The Guardian

www.theguardian.com/culture/2004/sep/15/1/print 2/4

What's this?

What's this?

It was also a formal act. Salcedo has said that she wanted the work to be an image of

emptiness. How many varieties of emptiness are there? How is it that one can say that

this work achieves its sense of exactness and precision? In the contest between walls

and mesh, the work and the gallery, something happens. The effect is not decorative and

there is no entertainment to be had here. This is a serious and complex art work. What

can one say of this room? It is at once holding its breath and having all the air crushed

out of it. Even the light feels constricted. I can do little more than tell you how it feels -

this empty room that refuses to offer more than a condition, a place to stand and be

silent.

Until October 18. Details: 020-7930 5373

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