U.F.O. (Untitled Folding Object) 1329 is a solo presentation that consists of a site-specific installation and a series of related drawings by the Brooklyn-based artist Reuven Israel. This exhibition continues the artist’s abiding interest in architecture and sacred spaces’ overlapping and conflicting histories.

Israel responds to the original structure of the gallery at KinoSaito. Formerly a Catholic school, the room’s height and large, gridded windows are reflected in the composition and scale of the installation, tailor-made to fit the space. Its title, Untitled Folding Object, refers to Israel’s ongoing series of tessellated sculptures. The number 1329 is the amount of individual components it consists of. The artist created 1329 small birch elements for this installation, laminating them with colored PVC edge-banding. Each standard part has the potential to unfold like a thread to form countless configurations within the space. The experience may be considered uncanny as if stepping into a pixelated image or a woven rug – an interconnected, total, and enclosed sculptural environment that holds within itself the tension of its unraveling self-destruction.

The piece begins as a flat rectangle on the gallery floor, with a diamond-shaped central void inspired by designs of Islamic courtyards (which often feature water at their center). For each unfolding structure, the segments stretch out and expand into three-dimensional space, leaving more swathes of the bare floor where they once neatly fit.

U.F.O. (Untitled Folding Object) 1329, is inspired by early modernist art movements, as well as Navajo and Hopi weaving traditions, Op Art, science fiction, video games, and sacred geometry. While U.F.O. (Untitled Folding Object) 1329 sprawls the length of the space, with visitors able to walk around it, a series of preliminary drawings adorn the gallery walls, inviting viewers in.

–Kathy Battista