Louise Bourgeois Abroad

Near the end of her life, the tiny artist Louise Bourgeois became interested in creating giant art. Environments rather than objects, these sculptural pieces, which she called “Cells”, are self-contained assemblages of personal artifacts, found furniture, and crafted objects, all housed within cage-like frames. And they’re now the focus of a traveling show, Structures of Existence: The Cells, currently on view at Garage Museum of Contemporary Art in Moscow. Arranged thematically, the poignant works—which explore the line between public and private, memory and imagination—look as though they were designed specifically for the Garage’s warehouse-like galleries. That’s no accident. “Our building is very much reminiscent of the place where Bourgeois created these works,” says chief curator Kate Fowle, “so we feel very lucky to be able to present them in a way that is aligned with her spirit.”