Jaume Plensa: Remote, Serene, Ethereal, co-presented by GRAY and Galerie Lelong, opened at GRAY New York on September 23. The exhibition features three elongated portraits in painted bronze surrounded by a suite of site-specific wall drawings by the artist.
Remote (Yolandita), 2026, Studio A
Painted bronze
87 3⁄4 × 24 3⁄8 × 28 5⁄8 inches
223 × 62 × 73 cm
Edition of 5
The titles of the three portraits—Remote (Yolandita), Serene (Ita), and Ethereal (Martina)— express an enduring tension in Plensa’s work, the space between the universal and the individual. While the foundational images in his portrait works come from specific figures from his community in Barcelona, the forms pull away from those individualities and move toward a more universal collective when elongated and monumentally scaled. At over two meters tall each, the sculpture installation offers a space of stillness and contemplation through which the viewer can pass.
Serene (Ita), 2026
Painted bronze
87 3⁄4 × 24 3⁄8 × 27 1⁄8 inches
223 × 62 × 69 cm
Edition of 5
Ethereal (Martina), 2026
Painted bronze
87 3⁄4 × 24 3⁄8 × 28 5⁄8 inches
223 × 62 × 73 cm
Edition of 5
Alongside, and as a counterpart to, his sculptural practice, Plensa has long pursued a method of drawing that is site-specific, immediate, and spontaneous. Drawn directly on the wall, Plensa’s charcoal portraits expand freely, responding to the architecture of each unique environment. The mural-sized drawings in Remote, Serene, Ethereal offer a two-dimensional echo of the three-dimensional sculptures, surrounding them in space.
The gallery show follows Plensa’s celebrated career survey A New Humanism, which opened at the Frederik Meijer Gardens and Sculpture Park in Grand Rapids, MI, and traveled to the Denver Botanic Gardens, and is concurrent to his solo show Invisible at the Museum Küppersmühle in Duisburg, Germany.
Jaume Plensa: Remote, Serene, Ethereal opened at GRAY New York on September 23 and will remain on view through December 19, 2026. Learn more at https://www.richardgraygallery.com/exhibitions/jaume-plensa15
ABOUT JAUME PLENSA
Over the past four decades, internationally celebrated Spanish artist Jaume Plensa (b. 1955) has produced a multifaceted body of work creating sculpture that speaks to the capacity and beauty of humanity. Conventional sculptural materials like glass, steel, and bronze blend with unconventional media such as water, light, and sound to create hybrid works of intricate energy, psychological weight, and symbolic richness.
In addition to his international museum and gallery exhibitions, Plensa has celebrated public projects on view around the world. Installations of his monumental sculptures include We at the Shard in London; Laura in Los Angeles; Behind the Walls at Rockefeller Center, New York and in the historic courtyard of Museo Nacional de Arte in Mexico City; Julia in Plaza de Colón in Madrid; Dreaming in Toronto; and Water’s Soul on the Hudson River. Plensa has received many national and international awards including the Honorary Doctorate from Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona in 2018 and the 2013 Velazquez Prize awarded by the Spanish Cultural Ministry. His solo museum exhibitions include Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Yorkshire, England; Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, Texas; Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid, Spain; MAMC–Musée d’art moderne et contemporain Saint-Étienne Métropole, Saint-Étienne, France; and Max Ernst Museum Brühl des LVR, Brühl, Germany. He lives and works in Barcelona.
ABOUT GRAY
GRAY is a globally recognized gallery devoted to fostering the development of artists’ careers and to building outstanding art collections. For more than six decades GRAY has supported the visions of artists by bringing exhibitions and projects to audiences around the world, working with collectors and institutions to foster practices and preserve legacies. Founded in Chicago in 1963 as Richard Gray Gallery and since 1997 also in New York City, the gallery, now titled GRAY and under the leadership of Paul Gray and Valerie Carberry, continues to be recognized for the exceptional quality of its program and for the expert counsel it provides to private and museum clients worldwide.
Artwork © Jaume Plensa, published with permission