Artwork by Adrián Villar Rojas

Bricks from UK independent manufacturer Northcot Brick have been used at the centrepiece in the exhibition ‘Today We Reboot The Planet’, by award winning Argentinian artist Adrián Villar Rojas at the new Serpentine Sackler Gallery in Kensington Gardens, London.

Northcot Brick supplied 45,000 facing bricks from its popular Multi Red Rustic range, for an original site-specific art installation, which saw the entire interior floor of the Gallery covered in bricks. In this installation, the artist re-imagines the architecture of the Grade II* listed building, formerly an 1805 ammunitions store known as The Magazine, and responds to the original brick vaulted Powder Rooms that sit at the centre of the building.

Renowned for his large-scale sculptural works, made in predominantly clay and brick, Villar Rojas draws much of his inspiration from the rawness and immediacy of traditional handmade brickmaking, which takes place on the brick farm in his hometown of Rosario in Argentina. This return to age-old and traditional practices – similar to that of returning to clay as material and sculpture as a form – is the artist’s path for inventing a symbolic world that speaks to the imagination.

Chosen predominantly for their form and character, Northcot’s bricks embody an engaging warmth of tone and variation of texture. The company produces not only wirecut bricks, but also manufactures handmade bricks, using bench mould techniques that have hardly changed over the centuries and are fired in the traditional way in one of the last remaining coal fired kilns in the UK.

“We are delighted to have been involved in such a prestigious project," said Michael Brown, Managing Director of Northcot Brick. “As a company, Northcot is passionate about making traditional characterful bricks, which have aesthetic value and appeal. As such, we feel a natural synergy with the work of Adrián Villar Rojas, whose exhibition we are keen to support.”