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Jesús Rafael Soto 1923, Ciudad Bolívar (Venezuela) - 2005, Paris (France) ground level

SOLO SHOWS (Selection)

2015 “Chronochrome” Galerie Perrotin, Paris and New York 2014-2015 “Pénétrable de Chicago”, The Institute of Chicago (6 October-15 March) 2014 “Jesús Rafael Soto: Houston Penetrable”, Museum of Fine , Houston, USA “Petite progression “Ecriture (Ecriture “Progresión elíptica “Ecriture Fiac 99”, “Grand Tes Jaune” 2013 “Soto dans la collection du Musée National d’Art Moderne”, Centre Pompidou, Paris 2012 “Soto: Paris and Beyond, 1950-1970”, Grey Art Gallery, New York (10 January-31 March) rosa et blanche”, 1976 noire)”, 1982 rosa y blanca”, 1974 1999 1979 2005 “Soto – A construcao da imaterialidade”, Centro cultural Banco do brasil, Rio de Janeiro (27 April-3 July) Paint on metal Paint on wood and Paint on metal Paint on wood and Paint on wood and metal 1997 “Jesús Rafael Soto”, Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris (January-March) 14 x 50 x 50 cm metal, nylon 260 x 243 x 150 cm metal, nylon 253 x 253 x 17 cm 1/4 3/4 1/16 1/2 1/2 3/4 touring: Stiftung fur Konkrete Kunst, Reutlingen, Germany (20 April-22 September) 51/2 x 193/4 x 193/4 in. 250 x 506 x 30 cm 102 x 95 x 59 in. 208 x 203 x 40 cm 99 x 99 x 6 in. 1/2 1/4 3/4 3/4 3/4 1993 “Retrospective”, Fundação de Serralves, Porto (April-June); touring: Musée des Beaux-arts de Pau, France (January – March) 98 x 199 x 11 in. 81 x 90 x 15 in. 1992 “Rétrospective”, Abbaye Saint-André, Centre d’Art Contemporain, Meymac, France (July-September) “Rétrospective”, Le Carré / Musée Bonnat, Bayonne, France (October-December) 1990 “Jesús Rafael Soto”, The Museum of , Kamakura, Japon, (19 May-10 June); touring: The Museum of Modern Art, Saitama, Japan (16 June-9 August) ; Iwaki City Art Museum, Japon (18 August-24 September); Itami City Museum of Art, Japan (23 November–20 January) STAIRWELL LOWER LEVEL “Jesús Rafael Soto”, Museum, Quadrat, Bottrop, Germany (14 October-9 December) 1985 “Soto, Space Art”, Center for the Fine Arts, Miami, USA (4 October-3 November) 1983 “Soto, Cuarenta años de creación”, Museo de Arte Contemporaneo, Caracas, Venezuela (June) Jesús Rafael Soto 1982 “Soto”, Palacio de Velázquez, Madrid (February-March) 1979 “Soto, oeuvres actuelles”, Musée National d’Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris (25 April-11 June) 1978 “Soto”, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebaek, Denmark (1 April-15 May) “Chronochrome” 1975 Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C. 1974 “Soto, Recent Reliefs and Sculptures”, Galerie Denise René, New York (9 November-7 December) curated by Matthieu Poirier “Soto, A Retrospective Exhibition”, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (November) 1972 “Soto”, Galerie Beyeler, Basel, Switzerland (April-May) 1968-1969 “Soto, Kinetische Werke”, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, (11 January -23 February 1969); touring: Palais des beaux-arts, Bruxelles; Musée d’art moderne de la Ville de Paris (June-August); Kunsthalle, Berne, Switzerland (21 “Verde inferior”, 1989 “Un orange “Untitled “Florence”, 1959 “Bleu supérieur” May - 30 June 1968); Kunstverein, Düsseldorf, Germany (October-November); Kestner-Gesellschaft, Hanovre, Germany Paint on wood and metal inférieur”, 1984 (Ambivalencia en el Paint on Isorel and metal 1999 espacio color n°12)” 1965 “Vibrations by Soto”, Kootz Gallery, New York (9-28 March) 93 x 62 x 17 cm Paint on wood and metal 75 x 75 x 27 cm Paint on wood and metal 1/2 1/2 3/4 1981 1/2 1/2 1/2 1959 “Soto”, Galerie Iris Clert, Paris (June) 36 x 24 x 6 in. 159 x 108 x 16 cm 29 x 29 x 10 in. 162 x 162 x 17 cm 1956 “Soto”, Galerie Denise René, Paris (9-31 March) 621/2 x 421/2 x 61/4 in. Paint on wood and metal Private collection 633/4 x 633/4 x 63/4 in. 156 x 106 cm 611/2 x 413/4 in. Paris New York GROUP SHOWS (Selection) January 10 – February 28, 2015 January 15 – February 21, 2015 2014-2015 “ZERO: Countdown to Tomorrow, 1950s-60s”, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (10 October 2014 - 7 January 2015); Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin “Radical Geometry, Modern Art of South America from the Patricia Phelps de Cisneros Collection”, Royal Academy of Arts, London (5 July-28 September) 2013 “Dynamo. A Century of Light and Motion in Art. 1913-2013” (curators: Serge Lemoine and Matthieu Poirier), Grand Palais, Paris 2010-2011 “Suprasensorial: Experiments in Light, Color and Space”, Museum of , Los Angeles; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C “Color abajo”, 1991 “Verde central”, 1991 “Untitled, (Mur “Columna rosa” “Vibración amarilla 2004 “MOMA at El Museo : Latin American & Caribbean Art from the Collection of the Museum of Modern Art”, El Museo del Barrio, New York Paint on wood and metal Paint on wood and metal bleu)”, 1966 1973 y blanca”, 1994 “Beyond Geometry: Experiments in Form, 1940s-70s”, Los Angeles County Museum of Art; touring: Miami Art Museum, USA 153 x 153 x 17 cm 153 x 153 x 17 cm Paint on wood and metal Paint on wood and Paint on wood and 1996 Venezuela Pavillon, São Paulo Biennale, Brazil 1/4 1/4 3/4 1/4 1/4 3/4 60 x 60 x 6 in. 60 x 60 x 6 in. 60 x 248 x 45 cm metal, nylon metal, nylon 1975 “The Movement”, Galerie Denise René, New York 231/2 x 971/2 x 173/4 in. 215 x 202 x 42 cm 102 x 102 x 27 cm 1967 “Lumière et Mouvement, Art Cinétique à Paris” (curator: Frank Popper), Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (May-August) 843/4 x 791/2 x 161/2 in. 401/8 x 401/8 x 101/2 in. 1966-1965 “Lumière, Mouvement et Optique / Licht und Bewegung, Kinetische Kunst” (curator: Harald Szeemann), Kunsthalle, Düsseldorf, Germany (2 February-3 March 1966); Kunsthalle, Baden-Baden, Germany (3 December 1965-9 January 1966); Palais des beaux-arts, Bruxelles (14 October-14 November 1965); Kunsthalle, Berne, Switzerland (3 July-5 September 1965) 1966 XXXIIIth Venice Biennale, Italy 1965 “Kinetic and Optical Art Today”, Albright Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, USA (27 February-28 March) Second exhibition “Nul” (curated by Willem Sandberg), Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (15 April-8 June) 1964 III, , Germany (27 June-5 October) Venezuela Pavillon, XXXIIth Venice Biennale, Italy 1963 VIIth São Paulo Biennale, Brazil 1962 XXXIth Venice Biennale, Italy 1961 “Bewogen Beweging” (curators: , Tinguely, Pontus Hulten), Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, The Netherlands “Vibración tricolor “8 plata”, 1968 “Untitled, (Tes à (10 March-17 April); touring: Moderna Museet, Stockholm; Louisiana Museum, Humlebaek, Denmark marrón, negra y azul” Paint on wood and metal bande rose)”, 1973 1958 XXIXth Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy (14 June-19 October) 1990 153 x 153 x 16 cm Paint on wood and metal 1955 “Le Mouvement” (Agam, Bury, Calder, , Jacobsen, Soto, Tinguely, Vasarely), Galerie Denise René, Paris 601/4 x 601/4 x 61/4 in. Paint on wood and 202 x 202 x 16 cm Collection of Hirshhorn 791/2 x 791/2 x 61/4 in. metal, nylon Museum and Sculpture 102 x 102 x 17 cm 1/8 1/8 3/4 Garden, Smithsonian 40 x 40 x 6 in. Institution, The Joseph H. Hirshorn Bequest, 1981, Washington All Artworks: © Jesús Rafael Soto. Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York, 2015 York, New All Artworks: © Jesús Rafael Soto. Artists Rights Society (ARS), in .’” Whether in the radical abstraction of the a sculpture or an environment, this key figure of radical Suprematist painter, or that of the Kinetic artist, the aim abstract art invites us to have an experience that is always was to escape the logic of pictorial confinement. unique, new every time: the experience of an incompleteness, The work was to be “open”—to borrow the expression a space-time continuum that can never be summed up in coined by with regard to as early an image or verbal account. More than any other abstract as 1962. Jean Clay seemed to see Soto’s “Penetrables” painting, relief or sculpture from the last decades, Soto’s (1967 onwards) as the extreme incarnation of this logic, kinetic art escapes photography. At a time when image is arguing that the ”rain” of fine, translucent and coloured all, this may be Soto’s work’s prime quality. plastic rods were the ultimate development of the “ambiguous space” that had first emerged in the first Matthieu Poirier holds a doctorate in from the plexiglas reliefs of the 1950s. Sorbonne, where he has also taught. Formerly a resident at Centre Allemand d’Histoire de l’Art, he recently curated or The works brought together at Galerie Perrotin in Paris co-curated “Post-Op. Perceptual Gone Painterly. 1957-2014” and New York may disconcert, disorient and seem elusive. (Galerie Perrotin, Paris, 2014), “Dynamo. A Century of Light The eye — and also the body in the case of “Penetrable” — is and Motion in Art. 1913-2013” (Galeries Nationales du subtly trapped, wandering endlessly in spaces that Grand Palais, Paris, 2013) and “” (Palais oscillate between painting and sculpture, object and image. de Tokyo, Paris, 2013). In the way it enters our perceptual space and refuses to be fully grasped, a work by Soto is, as Henri Bergson On the occasion of the exhibition, a 184-page monograph would put it, an object that no one has seen and that no has been published, with an essay by Matthieu Poirier and a one ever will see in its totality. Whether with a wall relief, chronology by Arnauld Pierre. “Sans titre, (Mur bleu)” / “Untitled, (Mur bleu)”, 1966. Paint on wood and metal. 60 x 248 x 45 cm / 231/2 x 971/2 x 173/4 in.

Jesús Rafael Soto “Chronochrome” on light and transparency in his writings “Vision in Motion”. curated by Matthieu Poirier “Chronochrome,” the title for this double exhibition, Galerie Perrotin, New York describes the kinetic exploration of the monochrome in January 15 – February 21, 2015 Soto’s work, in which pure colour leaves the stable support of the surface in order to become a vibratory Galerie Perrotin presents “Chronochrome,” a double phenomenon, playing with the of real space exhibition dedicated to Jesús Rafael Soto (1923-2005), held and time. Following this and concerning the first plexiglas simultaneously in its Paris and New York spaces. Organized in reliefs from the early 1950s, the Jean Clay explains collaboration with the artist’s Estate and curated by Matthieu that “through the play of stripes at various angles,” Soto Poirier, the exhibition presents some sixty works from obtained “surprising effects of unequal weight, as if each private collection or institutions, created between 1957 sheet corresponded to a different planet, as if each series and 2003. Soto’s work continues to draw international of stripes was responding differently to the laws of universal attention: in 2012, Grey Art Gallery in New York presented gravity. [...] A step to one side sets in motion a whole play of “Soto: Paris and Beyond, 1950-1970”, a large exhibition divergent levitations, creating the disturbing sensation that of fifty works by the artist and in 2013, the Musée National contradictory physical rules are prevailing simultaneously d’Art Moderne — Centre Georges Pompidou — exhibited twenty over the micro-space that Soto has managed to trap.” donated key works of the artist. In 2014, the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston and the Art Institute of Chicago At play here, then, we have a psycho-physiological — and not respectively presented two installations, “Houston imaginary — experience of weightlessness, within a universe Penetrable” and “Pénétrable de Chicago”. Soto’s works crisscrossed by forces described as “non-Euclidian,” in occupied an important place in the exhibitions “Dynamo. other words, escaping rational apprehension: during the A Century of Light and Motion in Art. 1913-2013” at moment of contemplation, the effect surpasses the Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais (2013), and the intellect’s capacity to grasp it. In the 1969 ARC / Musée recent “ZERO: Countdown to Tomorrow, 1950s–60s” d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris exhibition catalogue at the Guggenheim Museum in New York, in the Frank dedicated to the artist, and the Stedelijk Museum in Lloyd Wright building where Soto had a major retrospective Amsterdam, Jean Clay stressed the highly spiritual back in 1974. dimension of the “radical dematerialisation” undertaken by the artist. He quoted Kasimir Malevich’s attack on the Jesús Rafael Soto was born in Venezuela in 1923. He theoretical framework that, according to him, governed trained at art school in Caracas and came to Paris in 1950, the new abstract painting of the day. “Malevich’s where he lived alternately with Caracas for the rest of his prophecy, made in 1919, is being fulfilled,” stated Clay. life. His work developed gradually from his first Parisian “‘Whoever makes abstract constructions, based on the pieces, created partly under the influence of the Neoplasticism mutual relations of colours within the picture is still of and the theories of Laszló Moholy-Nagy confined to the world of aesthetics, rather than bathing “Écriture (Écriture noire)”, 1982. Paint on wood, metal and nylon. 250 x 506 x 30 cm / 981/2 x 1991/4 x 113/4 inches “Untitled (Ambivalencia en el espacio color n°12)”, 1981. Paint on wood and metal. 156 x 106 cm / 611/2 x 413/4 in.