Entering Mater is like crossing a threshold and finding yourself in a place where images seem to come to life, objects change meaning and the perception of reality becomes uncertain. This is the universe built by the artist Gonzalo Borondo at the Villa Stuck Museum in Munich, where from 29 October 2026 to 29 March 2027 the artist presents an immersive installation that interweaves visual arts, sound and poetry. More than a simple exhibition, Mater is a work to be walked through, conceived to challenge the boundary between what we see and what we imagine, between tangible matter and the symbolic dimension.
The project stems from a dialogue with the villa’s monumental spaces, following their structure and theatricality. After Chrysalis, the 2025 intervention on the museum’s façade during the renovation works, Gonzalo Borondo returns to engage with the legacy of Franz von Stuck, reinterpreting his idea of the total work of art. The path brings together seemingly distant references: fairy tales, classical mythology, religious iconography and contemporary imaginaries overlap, giving rise to unexpected encounters, such as the one between Alice and Pygmalion or between Frankenstein and the Passion of Christ. In this interweaving, the symbols of the past do not remain anchored to their origin, but become tools to question the desires, memories and contradictions of the present.
The title, too, holds a plurality of meanings. Mater, a Latin word meaning mother, evokes origin and creation, but also refers to matter as the substance from which the world takes shape. Borondo explores precisely this tension through different materials and techniques: from oil and acrylic painting to engraved glass, from wax to salvaged industrial objects, and even fragments from ecclesiastical artifacts. Among the works are a zoetrope, a mirror to walk through, musical automatons and a crystal labyrinth traversed by X-ray images. Objects and devices that turn perception into an unstable experience, where the boundary between illusion and reality grows ever thinner.
Two key collaborations complete the installation: the Spanish poet Ángela Segovia, who wrote original texts conceived for the project, and the musician Niño de Elche, who created the sound space together with the artist. Words, images and sounds thus come together to build a unified environment, in which the visitor is not merely a spectator, but an integral part of the work. In a present where religious symbols increasingly circulate outside their original contexts, across music, cinema and digital visual culture, Mater rereads their meaning as an expression of desire, loss, belonging and redemption. The exhibition thus becomes a reflection on art’s capacity to transform matter and, through it, the way we look at the world.
Perhaps the value of Mater lies precisely in its ability to remind us that not everything has to be understood or explained to have meaning. Sometimes, letting ourselves be surprised by what we don’t know is already a way of looking at reality from a different perspective.
