The geometric look in the brilliant art of two women

Invited by the MACBA Management to carry out an anthological tour, more than 80 works occupy the four floors of the museum corresponding to “The mirror and the disorder” of Natalia Cacciarelli. and “Utopian Drift”of Gilda Picabeaboth under the curatorship of Belen ColuccioThese artists with extensive experience adhere to geometric abstraction and have works in the museum’s permanent collection.

Natalia Cacciarelli (Bahía Blanca, 1971), winner of several awards from the University of Salvador, the Klemm Foundation, the Palais de Glace, and Banco Provincia, she participated in ARTEBA and in various solo and group exhibitions in Argentina, the United States, Peru, Costa Rica, and Uruguay.

Of Adolfo Nigrosays that “I learned to always be in the studio, painting, reading, watering the plants, living the daily life in my workspace.” Pablo Siquier“I learned a lot of technique, the tricks to perfect my geometric obsession.” He also points out that he engages in an imaginary dialogue with Sol Lewit, Imi Knoebel, Ad Reinhardt, Tomma Abtsall leading artists in minimalism, conceptual art and geometric abstraction, who sought spirituality through shapes and colors.

A constant in Cacciarelli It is repetition, extreme neatness, precision and symmetry. Installed in the contemporary artistic environment, her work stood out in 2014 in “Geometry at the limit”exhibition at MACBA curated by Rodrigo Alonso in which he brought together artists from generations closer in time who were exploring this language that seems to never be exhausted.

Cacciarelli also used watercolours, which perhaps allowed her greater freedom of expression, hence the reason for the changes that can be seen in informalist or expressionist brushstrokes that distance her from her obsession with pure and hard geometry. She retains her precision and obsession, but opens herself up to new expressions.

Gilda Picabea (Buenos Aires, 1974), studied at the Prilidiano Pueyrredón, attended the color seminar taught by Karina Peisajovich, took part in a work clinic with Cynthia Kampelmacher and also studied with the teacher and artist Tulio de Sagastizábal.

I work in “The Red Line” by Lidy Prati, research project, artistic and curatorial intervention on the Concrete Art collection of the National Museum of Fine Arts, a history linked to the Arturo magazine about “White, Black and Red”of Piet Mondrian. Prati had proposed reproducing it for the magazine at the time, but given the costs, it was not done. A complex and difficult investigation since some copies are kept in private collections, in institutions abroad and none in the country. Picabea attempts to repair this devaluation of Prati in her character as a woman who was part of the concrete group.

Since 1940 geometric painting has played an important role in Argentina. Since the book of Nelly Perazzo “Concrete Art in Argentina in the 40s”, published in 1983, in which the author recorded the movements, manifestos, derivative movements, emblematic artists, new music, the action of architects and designers, the history of the magazine Arturo until a recent review, “Neo Post- 50 years of Geometric Painting in our country (1970-2020)” under the curatorship of Rodrigo Alonso Terms such as sensitive geometry, neo-geo, parageometries, ornamental geometry, post-geometry and the emphasis on new generations appeared on display in this museum.

In the sector dedicated to 21st Century Geometry, Gilda Picabea was included with Pablo Siquier, Alfredo Londaibere, Pablo Sinaiamong others, which means that this discipline can be infinite.

Recent large-format works have been selected for this exhibition. Picabea It gives continuity to the developments of South American abstraction that had their mythical origin in 1944 and that derive from many of its references, with great skill and also with a new perspective.

(Until October. Av. San Juan 328. Closed on Tuesdays. Monday to Friday from 12 to 7 pm. Saturdays, Sundays and holidays from 12 to 7 pm.)