The house that Jorge built

Cuban-born artist Jorge Pardo has taken interior design to a whole other level. In creating an artwork out of an abandoned and dilapidated building in Mérida, the state capital of Yucatán, Mexico, Pardo has produced what might be described as a sumptuous, part-baroque, part-Gothic interior, with heavy Mayan influences.

Since he cannot transport the building wholesale into Britain, Pardo has installed a selection of works inspired by it into the Haunch of Venison gallery. This is his second exhibition in the gallery featuring his four-year Mérida House project (the first was in 2003), and he has created something eminently quirky and unique. Yet the works also show a building that has beautifully absorbed the ancient influences of its surrounding landscape.

The walls of the gallery have been plastered with layered photographs of the building’s interior: a delicately vibrating vision in hues of swimming-pool blue and turquoise green. A slightly dizzying sensation accompanies the viewing of these images – the shelves, the sofa, the bathroom, an opulent dining room – as if they’re seen through a tessellating prism of water. You can, however, still appreciate Pardo’s nifty handiwork – and the fact that he is clearly an artist who has no problems bringing together oldfashioned craft and high art in the pursuit of functional design.

Along the wall’s surfaces are giant masks that have clearly been influenced by ancient Mayan sculptures that populate the landscape of Mérida. In this context, they look like giant door knockers. Though glowing in gorgeous colours, they are slightly threatening, too, effectively performing their secondary function of warding off evil spirits. Prettiest of all, though, are Pardo’s ‘snowdrop’ lamps dangling from the ceiling: huge white globes made up of tiny repeated motifs, designs sympathetic to the surrounding environment, such as a leaf or an animal.

By creating this space in a gallery, Pardo conveys a sense of the ghostly, empty spaces of the Mérida House. This hints at the building’s recent past, as well as its splendid present, and is certainly heady and seductive stuff.

Jorge Pardo
6 Haunch of Vension Yard
W1