Gunther Gerzso 80Th Birthday Show
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Gunther Gerzso 80th Birthday Show September 28 - October 28, 1995 Mary-Anne Martin/Fine Art 23 East 73 Street New York, NY 10021 Tel (212) 288-2213 Fax (212) 861-7656 Selections from this exhibition will travel to 1 Galerie Rahn, Zurich in Spring, 1996 Gunther Gerzso in his studio, 1991 photograph by Carole Patterson Cover illustration:13. Muro rosa y naranja, 1962 2 Gunther Gerzso was born June 17, 1915, in married Gene Rilla Cady, a musician from California Mexico City. His mother, Dore Wendland, a German who was studying at the Playhouse. They settled in born in Berlin, was a singer and a pianist. His father Mexico in 1941 and Gerzso devoted himself to being Oscar Gerzso, a Hungarian businessman who an artist full-time. However, the uncertain finances emigrated to Mexico in the 1890’s, died in 1916. which developed from this decision led him to accept At the age of twelve Gerzso was sent to Lugano, an offer in 1942 to design sets for the movies. During Switzerland to live with his uncle, Dr. Hans Wendland, the next twenty years he designed sets for about 250 an art dealer, collector and art historian. Wendland films, working with such important directors as Luis took over the direction of Gerzso’s education, with the Buñuel, John Ford and Yves Allegret. Painting idea that the young boy would become his heir. They became a hobby. lived on a large estate, filed with valuable paintings, His paintings from the 40’s and 50’s had two and Gerzso received primary influences. The first intensive training in the was an appreciation of the history of art. He attended Mexican landscape and pre- Swiss schools and met Columbian art which was influential figures in the awakened by his travels European art world, among while filming. The second them the painter Paul Klee was Surrealism which was (although Gerzso was not fostered by his friendship then aware that this was an with the poet Benjamin important artist) and the Péret, and the artists Leonora Italian set designer, Nando Carrington, Remedios Varo Tamberlani, who inspired and Wolfgang Paalen, Gerzso’s later interest in this refugees who made their field. In 1930, due to the way to Mexico from war-torn Depression, his uncle was Europe in the 1940’s. forced to sell his estate and A trip to Greece in 1959 art holdings and Gerzso inspired his work for the next decided to return to Mexico three years, his so-called City to live with his mother Greek period. However, by and sister. He attended the 1962 pre-Columbian influ- German school there from ences had reappeared in his 1931-33 and received his paintings. abitur degree. During this Gerzso retired from film period, he drew designs for set design in 1962 to devote theater sets and costumes, 5. Presence of the Past, 1953 himself to painting full-time not imagining that he would ever see them executed. (though in 1983 he was persuaded by John Huston to However, the year after graduation he met come out of retirement temporarily and do the art Fernando Wagner, an actor, producer, and director, direction for the film of Malcolm Lowry’s novel Under who used Gerzso’s stage designs for productions of the Volcano). In 1978 he received the National Prize of works by Molière, Lope de Vega, and Shakespeare. In Mexico and in 1991 he was named Academico 1935, Gerzso moved to Cleveland, Ohio to study at the Honorario by the Society of Architects of Mexico. Cleveland Playhouse where he soon became staff set Today Gerzso lives in Mexico City with his wife, designer. Over the next four years he designed sets for Gene. They have two sons: Michael, an architect and more than fifty plays. computer consultant in Mexico, and Andrew, a flutist In 1940, encouraged by an artist friend, Gerzso who lives in Paris and is currently musical assistant to began teaching himself to paint. Later that year he the conductor, Pierre Boulez. 3 Visiting Gunther Gerzso Mary-Anne Martin first saw a painting by Gunther Gerzso at the is impressive. There is an exterior staircase Galería de Arte Mexicano. It was my first trip leading to a room with an alcove. Everything I to Mexico and I had come to pay my respects seems spotless. No drips of paint on the floor, no to the famous art dealer, Inés Amor. After a quiet evidence of furious creativity. Just one painting in talk with this extraordinary woman, who had the progress on the easel, and possibly a work that is ability to make first time visitors feel like long lost finished and wrapped up neatly in brown paper friends, she asked me if I would like to see some waiting to be picked up. More books. A collection paintings by contemporary Mexican artists. At that of tacky snow domes sent from all over by friends time I was a cataloguer of modern paintings at who know he thinks they are funny. If Gunther Sotheby’s and was familiar with only the biggest feels expansive he will open up a few drawers in names—Rivera, Orozco, Siqueiros. Occasionally the flat files and show you some recent prints. Or we had a Tamayo, too. I eagerly accepted Ms. he will take you to the “Cemetery,” where he Amor’s invitation and she showed me several keeps paintings that he has started and has works. The Gerzso stands out in my memory. The abandoned at some stumbling point. Sometimes colors were vibrant and the surface was glassy he will show you a work from a style that he tried and cold. I remember my reaction as one of and discarded—perhaps a dada collage. On puzzlement. With all my art historical preparation another occasion he will give you a glimpse of his and my years of training in an auction house, I archives. Here he keeps a pencil sketch of almost was unable to place this painting in a convenient every painting he has made, together with nota- pigeon hole. It reminded me of no Mexican tions about the medium, its present whereabouts. painting I had ever seen and even less of the In most cases he has a good transparency of the European ones I was used to. painting as well. In this meticulous record keep- So many years later, with thirteen years in an ing he is like Klee or Kandinsky. auction house behind me and thirteen years since The comparison to Kandinsky is not acciden- I started my gallery, I still know no painter quite tal. Gerzso’s studio is orderly, his mind is like Gunther Gerzso. disciplined, his paintings are the product of a I’m not exactly sure of the first time that I met reasoned aesthetic. Here is visual music: endless him. The Gerzso house in San Angel felt like a themes and variations, full of harmony, color, cool sanctuary with leafy gardens visible from discordant notes, tensions and peaceful resolu- within. I immediately liked this avuncular figure tions. Gerzso works like a composer, orchestrating with a sardonic wit who reminded me of my his compositions. He cannot run out of ideas; the Viennese father. “I was assembled in Mexico,” he notes can be replayed in countless arrangements. told me when I ask him about his European Gunther Gerzso is Mexican. Trained in Europe ancestry. I liked his wife Gene, who had her own not as a painter but as an art historian, he sense of humor and who understood what made returned to the land where he was born and Gerzso tick. There were acres of bookshelves and developed an artistic vocabulary that is his alone. paintings hanging everywhere. The Gerzsos were He copies no other master. He celebrates the people that I would have liked to be with under landscape of Mexico and its pre-Columbian any circumstances. That Gunther happened also beginnings. He paints the heart and soul of to be a great painter was a fact completely apart. Mexico. Going up to Gunther’s studio for the first time Celebrating Gunther Gerzso’s 80th birthday 4 with a show in his honor seems right. In 1982 we Hank Hine suggested that the artist create some inaugurated this gallery with a Gerzso retrospec- color etchings at the Limestone Press, Hine’s print tive show in Paris at FIAC, organized with our studio. Although Gerzso had produced litho- friends and associates, Mariana Pérez Amor and graphs before and silkscreens as well, he had Alejandra Yturbe of the Galería de Arte Mexicano. made only one etching up till then, a small black The following year we again collaborated with and white experiment. The Limestone experience GAM in the publication with Edicions du Griffon was a great success and the resulting portfolio of in Neuchâtel, Switzerland of an important mono- ten etchings by Gerzso accompanied by ten graph on Gerzso with texts by Octavio Paz and poems by Octavio Paz was published in 1990. John Golding. In 1984 we presented this book at Gerzso was encouraged by Hine to produce a Mary-Anne Martin/Fine Art at the opening of suite of five large etchings and aquatints from Gerzso’s first New 1993-5 which York retrospective Mary-Anne Martin/ show. Since then Fine Art exhibited we have collabo- at ArtMiami ’95. In rated in the 1995 they pro- publication of duced a series of Gerzso’s first suite twelve Temples, of bronze sculp- evoking Mexican tures, an idea born archeological of the friendship sites, small lyrical among three etchings printed in Gerzso admirers: dark green ink.