Giuseppe Penone's work is full of surprises, rarely what it appears to be at first sight. The three pieces currently on display at Marian Goodman are no exception, when they embrace the element of deception that comes hand in hand with Penone's preoccupation with the fusion of the animal and the vegetal, the human and the mineral.

On the gallery's upper floor, a sculpture, "La Geometria nelle mani/The Geometry in the hands," (2007) is accompanied by three large hung canvases: "Pelle di gafite/The skin of graphite," (2003/2006). Each canvas is subtitled with the name of a mineral: Rodonite, Purpurite and Uraninite.  From a distance, the three canvases appear three dimensional - engaging in the tactility so familiar to other of Penone's works. The palpable patterns made in graphite on black canvas seem to trace the lines of a human hand, apparently executed through projection of an enlarged image onto the canvas. We are appropriately convinced of the correspondence between the skin of the human hand and the traces of natural forms. But as we move closer, the canvases dissolve into two dimensional abstractions as they reveal themselves as nothing but graphite marks on a black ground.

In the downstairs gallery, Lo spazio della scultura (Pelle di cedro)/The space of the sculpture, (Skin of cedar)," (2001), seen in Paris at the 2004 exhibition at the Centre Pompidou, appears as a blanket of bark strips that covering the floor. At least this is how they appear as we go down the stairs. On inspection, however, we realize they are bronze, not bark, cast from the negative imprint of the "skin of the tree." Thus, the works achieve a visual semblance between the unlikely materials: bark and bronze. And then, as we sit with them, these bronze plates take on the appearance of the skin of dead creatures laid out to dry. There is one bronze plate in the middle of the others, perched on the branches of a (dead) tree, then covered in leather, fully convincing us that a hunter has been through these parts and left the traces of death in his wake. As they oscillate between dead trees, animal skins, fossil like remnants of a moment past, these bronze plates are melancholic, with absolutely no hope of a future revival.

The continuing appeal of Penone's work with natural materials to evoke the interface and, often the fusion, of the human and the natural world comes in their recourse to traditional sculpture. The otherwise exploratory works are meticulously crafted using traditional materials - bronze, canvas, paint, even trees and stone have been used for centuries - to engage with the eternal concern of the human place within the natural world.

- Frances Guerin

(Images top-bottom:  Guiseppe Penone.  Courtesy of Marian Goodman Gallery, Paris)

Top image:  La geometria nella mani/(The geometry in the hands), 2007, Bronze & polished stainless steel.

Middle image:  L-Pella di grafite (reflesso di rodonite)/(The skin of graphite (reflexion of rodonite), 2003-2006, Graphite on balck paper;  Mid-Sculpture; R-Pella di grafite (reflesso di uraninitee)/(The skin of graphite (reflexion of uraninite), 2003-2006, Graphite on canvas.

Bottom image:   Lo spazio della scultura (Pelle di cedro)  / The space of the sculpture (skin of cedar); (detail), 2001. Bronze & leather.