Leon Tovar Gallery is proud to announce its participation in Intersect Aspen 2022. The Gallery’s display will show works by two Venezualan artists integral to Modern Art throughout Latin America and Europe— Carlos Cruz-Diez and Jesús Rafael Soto. Both artists were active in Paris, with Soto arriving in 1950 and Cruz-Diez following in 1960, which welcomed them to a dynamic community of experimental artists such as Yves Klein, Lygia Clark, the Madí group, Fernand Leger and more. 

 

Experimentation was fundamental to Soto and Cruz-Diez’s theoretical approach, as they sought new means of expression. Cruz-Diez innovated in this way through liberation of color. He stripped color down to its essential monochromatic purity, evident in Physichromie No. 2108’s focus on making color autonomous, to complex ends. The Physichromies, arguably Cruz-Diez’s most ambitious and successful project, are purely abstract investigations of color dependent on the viewer. In developing color theory and principles of color addition, combined with his near-scientific precision of material placement, the Physichromie seems to vibrate and create illusions depending on the movement and perspective of the viewer. Therefore, the spectator is transformed into an active part of the piece, an idea that lends itself to an egalitarian outlook, in which viewing and experiencing Cruz-Diez’s work is an individual and personal experience for everyone. 

Jesús Rafael Soto also experimented with playful, interactive, and experimental work. Soto participated in Le Mouvement, an exhibition at Galerie Denise Rene that effectively launched Kinetic Art. With an emphasis on movement, Soto transfers the artistic agency from artist to audience as demonstrated when the viewer walks around a work, for example in Double écriture noir et vert, they should experience a sense of vibration and illusion due to Soto’s understanding of geometry, negative space and color theory. The viewer’s optical experience will be ephemeral and complex as Soto has overcome the limitations of easel painting by invoking the spectator.