Mika Rottenberg's London debut inaugurates Goldsmiths CCA with absurdist installations

Mika Rottenberg's exhibition at Goldsmiths Centre for Contemporary Art in London ran from 8 September to 4 November 2018, marking her first solo show in the city. The Argentinian artist presented video installations featuring looping narratives with apathetic female characters engaged in absurd production cycles, blurring fiction and reality through sculptural elements. Works included Cosmic Generator (Variant 4) (2017–18), which depicted underground tunnels at the Mexico–US border and the Yiwu International Trade City in China, highlighting global trade paradoxes. Other pieces like Bowls Balls Souls Holes (Bingo Variant) (2014) and NoNoseKnows (Artist Variant) (2015) replicated game rooms and pearl workshops, immersing viewers in perpetual motion. Rottenberg's two-decade career has developed a visual language critiquing capitalist dynamics, with prior appearances at the 2015 Venice Biennale and Documenta 14 in Athens. The show inaugurated Goldsmiths CCA, a new cultural venue in former baths refurbished by Turner Prize-winning collective Assemble, adding to London's art scene. Her installations adapt to spaces, using portals to mirror relentless global cycles without resolution, engaging audiences in a Beckettian limbo.