ARTISTS
ESPACES CHROMATIQUES, 1967
light box, 30 x 30 cm
Gregorio Vardanega
Born in Possagno Italy, Gregorio Vardanega’s family relocated to Buenos Aires when he was three years old. As a young man, he studied in the Academia Nacional de Bellas Artes (1939-1946) in Buenos Aires, and graduated as professor of drawing. In 1946, he participated in the exhibitions organized by the Asociación Arte Concreto-Invención, and two years later, he traveled with Carmelo Arden Quin to Europe. The trip was an important moment in the artist's formation; a year later, he showed work at the Salon de Amérique latine in Paris, and this exhibition put him in contact with the important figures involved in Paris’s growing kinetic movement, including Denise René, Georges Vantongerloo, Nicolas Pevsner, Sonia Delaunay, Max Bill, and Constantin Brancusi. When he returned to Buenos Aires, he began making his earliest kinetic works, using metal bands and celluloid.
At the center of many of Argentina’s avant-garde artistic circles, Vardanega was a founding member of the Asociación Arte Nuevo in 1955 and, the following year, of Artistas No Figurativos Argentinos (ANFA). In 1957, he was included in the group exhibition 14 Pintores abstractos at the Galatea gallery in Buenos Aires. He received the gold medal in the International Exposition in Brussels in 1957, and was included in the IV São Paulo Bienal.
In 1959, Vardanega moved to Paris with Martha Boto, and began experimenting with Plexiglas spheres, illuminated with moving projections of colored lights. All of his subsequent work explored the aesthetic of light, movement, color, and electronic programs. He was especially drawn to the cultural phenomena of machines that “think.” As did many kinetic artists, Vardanega thought of his work as in dialogue with architecture and urban planning. He hoped his towers and light works would be accompanied by music and other modes of performative work; he considered many of the sculptures to be prototypes for large-scale public projects. His first major exhibition in Paris, Chromocinétisme (1964), was a two-person show with Boto at the Maison des Beaux-Arts. His work has subsequently been included in numerous important surveys of kinetic art.
Vardanega died in Paris in 2007.
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Exhibitions2015: Un tournant | A turning point: Antonio Asis, Martha Boto, Horacio García Rossi, Hugo De Marziani, Gregorio Vardanega, Sicardi Gallery, Houston, TX, USA 2013: Dynamo: A Century of Light and Motion in Art, 1913-2013, RMN – Grand Palais, Paris, France 2012: Constructed Dialogues: Concrete, Geometric and Kinetic Art from the Latin American Collection, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH), Houston, TX, USA Real/Virtual, Arte Cinético Argentino de los Años Sesenta, Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Buenos Aires, Argentina 2009: North Looks South: Building the Latinamerican Art Collection, Upper Brown Pavilion, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH), Houston, TX, USA Color into Light: Selections from the MFAH Collection, Upper Brown Pavilion, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH), Houston, TX, USA 2007: Lo[s] Cinético[s], Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid, Spain 2006: Contact: Le cyber-cosmos de Boto et Vardanega, Sicardi Gallery, Houston, TX, USA Appel Design, Berlin, Germany Kinetische Kunst: Ver-rückte Ansichten, Städtisches Museum Gelsenkirchen, Germany Light and Shadow Galerie von Bartha, Basel, Switzerland 2005: Lichtkunst aus Kunstlicht, ZKM, Karlsruhe, Germany Escultura- Objeto, Museo de Arte Moderno Buenos Aires (MAMBA), Buenos Aires, Argentina L’Œil moteur- Art optique et cinétique, 1950-1975, Musée d'Art Moderne et Contemporain (MAMCS), Strasbourg, France 2004: Moving Parts: Forms of the Kinetic, Museum Tinguely, Basel, Switzerland; Kunsthaus, Graz, Austria 2003: Arte Abstracto, Argentino Fundación PROA, Buenos Aires, Argentina 2001: Abstract Art from the Rio de la Plata: Buenos Aires and Montevideo, Americas Society, New York, NY, USA Denise René: L’intrépide, Musée National d’Art Moderne, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France 2000: Fluorescence, Galerie Denise René - Rive Gauche, Paris; Espace Marais, Paris 1999: Art Construit, Art Cinétique d’Amérique Latine, Galerie Denise René, Paris, France 1992: L’Art en Mouvement, Fondation Maeght, Saint-Paul de Vence, France 1984: Carte blanche à Denise René, Paris Art Center, France Face à la Machine, Maison de l’Amérique Latine, Paris, France 1983: Electra, Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, France 1982: L’Amérique Latine à Paris, Grand-Palais, Paris, France 1976: Centre d’action culturelle “Les Gémeaux,” Sceaux, France 1969: Galerie Denise René, Paris, France 1968: Art Cinétique, Maison de la Culture, Grenoble, France Denise René à Londres, Redfern Gallery, London, UK 1967: Lumière et Mouvement, Art Cinétique à Paris, Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, France Structures, Lumière et Mouvement, Galerie Denise René, Paris, France Light Motion Space, Walker Arts Center, Minneapolis, MN, USA; Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY, USA 1965: Sigma I, Galerie des Beaux-Arts, Bordeaux, France Argentina en el mundo. Artes visuales 2, Centro de Artes Visuales del Instituto Torcuato Di Tella, Buenos Aires, Argentina 1964: Maison des Beaux-Arts, C.R.O.U.S., Paris, France Mouvement 2, Galerie Denise René, Paris, France Hanover Gallery, London, UK Lumière, Mouvement et Optique, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Brussels, Belgium 1963: L’Art Latino-américain, Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, France 1962: Trente Argentins de la Nouvelle Génération, Galerie Creuze, Paris, France Musée du Havre, Paris, France 1959: Galería H, Buenos Aires, Argentina 1958: L’Art visuel en Argentine, Exposition universelle et internationale, Brussels World Fair, Brussels, Belgium (Gold Medal) 1957: IV Bienal de São Paulo, Brazil 1956: Galería Estímulo, Buenos Aires, Argentina 1955: Galería Galatea, Buenos Aires, Argentin
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International art fairsCentro de Artes Visuales del Instituto Torcuato di Tella, Buenos Aires, Argentina Cisneros Fontanals Art Foundation (CIFO), Miami, FL, USA Fonds National d’Art Contemporain, Paris, France Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne, Australia Kemper Museum, Kansas City, MO, USA Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI, USA Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville, Paris, France Musée National d’Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France Museo de Arte Contemporáneo Latinoamericano (MACLA), La Plata, Argentina Museo de Arte Latinoamericano (MALBA), Buenos Aires, Argentina Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Buenos Aires, Argentina Museu de Arte Moderna de Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH), Houston, TX, USA Museum of Geometric and MADI Art, Dallas, TX, USA Recklinghausen Museum, Recklinghausen, Germany Rembrandt van Rijn Foundation, The Cape, South Africa Tel-Aviv Museum of Art, Tel-Aviv, Israel
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