Class Reunion by Nairy Baghramian

Class Reunion is a gathering of sleek, slinky sculptures by the Berlin-based artist Nairy Baghramian. Playing around with old modernist ideas about abstraction and artistic purity, she’s given these gangly bits of painted metal and coloured rubber character traits, with a wall label that names them according to type. There’s the Slacker, the Dandy, Mr Hunger and Please After You, to mention only a few. Though most have been realised in tasteful black or white, there’s a lone show-off in shocking flamingo pink.

They also bring to mind elusive pieces of interior decor: hat stands or lamps perhaps, or even walking sticks, a likeness that harks back to their conception. Currently installed at London’s Serpentine Gallery, they were first created for the artist’s 2008 show The Walker’s Day Off in Baden-Baden, the German city renowned for its super-rich residents and where wealthy women attend cultural events with paid escorts on their arms. In Baghramian’s show however, these gents got the chance to have the day to themselves while her sculptures escorted visitors through the gallery.

What this wry piece of social observation seems to get at, are the invisible power systems that make art run. Like the figure of the Walker, the intimate who doesn’t quite belong, the work points to questions about inclusion and exclusion; what gets in and who’s left out. These questions hover in the air around the collection, as the art space becomes the stage-set for an ongoing performance between people and things. As visitors mingle with the Class Reunion, Baghramian subtly nudges our attention towards the relationships set up between people, objects and the gallery space itself. It’s up to us to decide if we want to fleetingly bestow her design-like creations with the status of art, or hang back in the wings.

Class Reunion is currently on view in Nairy Baghramian and Phyllida Barlow's joint show at London’s Serpentine Gallery until 13 June