Rogelio
Polesello
1958—1974
06.26—
10.12.2015

Rogelio Polesello
1958—1974
06.26— 10.12.2015
Opening: Thursday, June 25
Guest curator: Mercedes Casanegra

Entradas Hacete Amigo Calendar

MALBA pays tribute to Rogelio Polesello (Buenos Aires, 1939-2014) with an anthological exhibition of his historical works, paintings, and acrylic pieces produced from the late fifties through the mid-seventies. The exhibition will feature a selection of 120 works from numerous public and private collections in Argentina and abroad.

The exhibition sets out to settle the unfinished business, so to speak, surrounding Polesello’s work insofar as there are areas of his production that have not been duly analyzed or recognized such as his parallel engagement with the new design and art and with the art-design-industry triad; for Polesello, design was at the limit of an industrial art. Polesello was one of the artists that took art beyond the confines of the museum as he experimented in other settings and with other languages. His participation in Argentine abstract geometric art and Op art was both autonomous and original as he freely expanded beyond those categories, dynamically and tirelessly facing conceptual and formal challenges.

Work on this exhibition began alongside the artist two years ago, when a team from the museum tackled the task of organizing and cataloguing the Polesello archive which contains a vast number of photographs and documents, as well as correspondence with other artists, art dealers, collectors, and directors of museums and art institutions. The archive attests to Polesello’s enormous production and his connections to people active in the art work and in other disciplines such as design, film, architecture, and fashion.

The exhibition will demonstrate the relevance over the course of five decades of work by an artist who defies classification. In conjunction with the exhibition, MALBA will publish a bilingual (Spanish-English) catalogue designed to become a crucial point of reference for Polesello’s historical production.

Rogelio Polesello

In 1958, Rogelio Polesello received a degree in printmaking, drawing, and painting from the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes Prilidiano Pueyrredón. In 1959, the first solo exhibition of his work was held at the Peuser Gallery. On that occasion, he showed geometric paintings with a constructivist influence that explored the possibilities of Op art. Throughout his career, he produced paintings, prints, and acrylic objects that examined the possibilities of geometric abstraction with optical effects that decomposed the image. From an early age, he worked in advertising design, which would lead him to have experiences beyond the confines of the art world. He engaged in interdisciplinary work connected to architecture, environmental design, textile design, body painting, and interventions in public space. His work has been exhibited in many museums and galleries in Argentina and abroad.

Outstanding solo exhibitions of Polesello’ work have been held at the Pan American Union, Washington (1961), the Museo de Bellas Artes de Caracas (1966 and 1968), the Universidad de Mayagüez, Puerto Rico (1966 and 1971), the Biblioteca Luis Ángel Arango of the Banco de la República, BogotaÅL (1967), the Centro de Artes Visuales of the Instituto Torcuato Di Tella, Buenos Aires (1969), the Center for Inter American Relations, New York (1973), the Museo de Arte Moderno de BogotaÅL (1973), the Museo de Arte Moderno-Bosque de Chapultepec, Mexico City (1973), the Palais de Glace, Buenos Aires (1995), the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Buenos Aires (2000), the Museo JoseÅL Luis Cuevas, Mexico City (2002), and the Centro Cultural Recoleta, Buenos Aires (2005).

His work forms part of the collections of the following institutions: the Museum of Modern Art, New York (MoMA), the Guggenheim, New York, the Art Museum of the Americas, Washington DC, the Blanton Museum, Austin, the Lowe Art Museum, Miami, the Museo de Arte Moderno de BogotaÅL, the Banco de la República, Bogotá, the Museo de Bellas Artes de Caracas, the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Buenos Aires, the Museo de Arte Moderno de Buenos Aires, Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires (MALBA), and the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Buenos Aires (MACBA).