Pablo Atchugarry

Volume 9 of our Tablet10 series featured the Estancia Vik José Ignacio, near Punta del Este, Uruguay. We interviewed the artist Pablo Atchugarry via email; here, in an online exclusive, is that conversation.

How did you get involved with the Estancia Vik?

I met Carrie and Alex Vik when they visited me in my studio in Manatiales and told me about their project, Estancia Vik, and their idea to have one of my pieces in the center of the building.

The piece is made of white marble stone from Carrara and was sculpted from a seven-ton block, measuring 3.5 meters in height. The work represents the importance of light and as a result is a vertical structure whose surface captures the changing light throughout the day.

How did the site affect your approach?

The placement of the piece in the center of the building transforms it into the fundamental stone of the Estancia and acts as the visual focal point of the living room space.

Alex says you’re working on something for the next Vik hotel. Can you talk about that?

I have just completed a very tall bronze relief called the “Puerta del Paradiso” (Door to Paradise). It is a door for the entrance to the Escultura (sculpture) building at the center of Playa Vik, the Estancia’s sister beachfront property, a creation from the architect Carlos Ott. The door weighs 890 kilograms. When I was making this piece, I was thinking about the Baptistry door in Florence, a work of the sculptor Gilberti which Michelangelo called “La Puerta del Paraiso.”

Does it feel different working for a hotel or guest house? Do you think about how the estancia’s guests will experience your work?

Each work of art will meet the public sometime or another, therefore it lives its best moment when it is discovered by the spectator. In the case of artwork in a hotel, it is a reflection of the owners’ vision and the mood they would like to create.