Jose Carlos Martinat Mendoza

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This sculpture is a scale model of the Peruvian military headquarters, an example of ‘brutalist’ architecture it was nicknamed the ‘Pentagonito’ (or ‘little Pentagon’). During the Fujimori presidency, the building became notorious for the torture, murders and disappearances conducted by the secret service. The sculpture incorporates a computer which has been programmed to search the internet for references to ‘Brutalismo / Brutalism’, picking up extracts about Latin American and global dictatorships but also on architecture, forging associations between different kinds of ‘brutalism’ which it spews out onto the gallery floor.

Gallery label, June 2011

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