EUROPE | Antoni Tàpies. From Object to Sculpture

The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao presents on October 4, 2013

Antoni Tàpies. From Object to Sculpture (1964–2009)

BILBAO, SPAIN
4 OCTOBER 2013 – 19 JANUARY 2014

To commemorate the first anniversary of the artist's death, the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao presents Antoni Tàpies. From Object to Sculpture (1964–2009), the first comprehensive, in-depth survey of a fascinating facet of an artist who marked the second half of the 20th century.

Objects and sculptures were central to Antoni Tàpies's artistic development and featured heavily throughout his career, constituting a unique and autonomous body of work. The exhibition features nearly one hundred works, spanning almost five decades: from Tàpies' early objects and assemblages of the 1960s and 70s to his more recent fire-clay and bronze pieces, including the last sculpture that he signed signed (2009). According to exhibition curator Álvaro Rodríguez Fominaya, the exhibition “reveals Tàpies' lifelong preoccupation with the sculptural problem and for the first time brings his sculpture face-to-face with itself.”

Sponsored by Iberdrola, the exhibition features nearly one hundred works spanning the Tàpies’s sculpture production spanning almost five decades: from the early objects and assemblages of the 1960s and 70s, to his more recent fire-clay and bronze pieces, including the last sculpture signed by the artist in 2009.

Organized both thematically and chronologically on the Museum's second floor, the exhibition features works in a range of dimensions, from the monumental to the small. By examining the chronological continuity, themes, materials, and mediums used by the artist, viewers are offered insight into the oeuvre of Antoni Tàpies ─ from his idea of the wall to re-creations of commonplace objects such as chairs, beds, skulls, and books.

Antoni Tàpies. From Object to Sculpture (1964–2009) is the fourth Guggenheim exhibition dedicated to the work of one of Spain's most international artists. The first was a major retrospective curated by Lawrence Alloway at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in 1962; the next was at the Guggenheim Museum SoHo, curated by Carmen Giménez in 1995; the most recent was a presentation of the Permanent Collection, Chillida/Tàpies: Matter and Visual Thought at the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, curated by Petra Joos in 2001 and later travelling to the Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin in 2002.

Tàpies produced his first autonomous, clearly three-dimensional objects in the mid-1960s. However, it was not until the 1980s that the word “sculpture” was formally introduced into his vocabulary.

The exhibition begins in the Museum's classical galleries with Tàpies’s sculptural output from the mid-1960s and 70s. This was a period of intense political activity for the artist, during which time he incorporated everyday objects into his research. These objects not only had ties with Art Informel, but also aligned him with other conceptual art movements that were emerging at the same time such as Arte Povera. Tàpies’s early objects also had their roots in Dadaism and Surrealism.

This is evident in some of the works in the first part of the exhibition: Cadira i roba (Chair and Clothes, 1970), Pila de plats (Pile of Plates, 1970), and Armari (Wardrobe, 1973). Made of furniture, paper, clothes, sawdust, or wood, these are the pieces that marked the birth of a language of “three-dimensional objects” in Tàpies’s career. The diversity of symbolic resources that characterize these works opened up many creative directions for the artist, as seen in Farcell (Bundle, 1970) and Cartó corbat I corda (Curved Cardboard and String, 1970).

Collage was the direct forerunner of his sculptures. In Rotllo de tela metàl·lica amb drap vermell (Roll of Chicken Wire with Red Rag, 1970) and Maqueta per a “Núvol i cadira” (Model for Cloud and Chair, 1988), Tàpies used mesh and chicken wire, malleable metals that helped to divide space and stand in opposition to natural organic elements, which he would also use in later decades.

The exhibition catalogue features essays by curator Álvaro Rodríguez Fominaya, Tony Godfrey, and Anatxu Zabalbescoa, introducing readers to the Catalonian artist's three-dimensional production. Antoni Tàpies: From Object to Sculpture (1964−2009) contains nearly one hundred reproductions as well as short comments by artists Miroslaw Balka, Cristina Iglesias, Marjetica Potrč, and Jessica Stockholder on specific works by Tàpies. The catalogue also contains a timeline and a glossary compiled by María José Balcells.

More information on: tapies.guggenheim-bilbao.es

Source: press materials