Argentina - Luis Felipe Noé at Venice Biennale

Noé always finds new languages to put his viewpoints across concerning the Argentine life tensions and antagonisms. 

As to the Biennale in question, it will take place from June 7 to November 22 and will primarily concern the exhibition of key artists works in the history of arts, who keep on coming up with works of art and certainly exert an influence on the coming generations. Noè` s having been selected to take part in this exhibition accurately fits with these guidelines. 

“His work epitomizes Argentina in the deepest, most symbolic, and real sense, with all of its contradictions, comings and goings seen in the last half century, in the past, the present and in both of these stages altogether, that is to say in the future time”, stated the reviewer Fabián Lebenglik, who has been appointed to serve as curator at this Biennale by the Argentine Foreign Office.

In turn, Noé confessed to having felt delighted at learning about such a recognition, “because I understand that this acknowledgement has to do with my current work and not simply with the one I produced in the 60´s. Creatively speaking, I feel alive and I do not consider myself as the shadow of an artist who lived in the 60`s”.

Born in Buenos Aires in 1933, the artist was a member of a Group called Otra Figuración (also known as the Nueva Figuración Group) between 1961 and 1965, and such membership was jointly shared with Ernesto Deira, Rómulo Maccio and Jorge de la Vega, who came to represent a rupture with Argentina´s hectic cultural life in the 60´s.

Noé´s work embodies a unique blend between an aesthetic and a political avant-garde movement. As from the paintings surface compartments trend, which is already evidenced in some of his pictures like “Mambo”, which he painted in 1962 or “Introducción a la esperanza” (“Introduction to Hope”) painted in 1963, Noé always finds new languages to put his viewpoints across concerning the Argentine life tensions and antagonisms.

As to León Ferrari, who was another oustanding Argentine artist invited to exhibit his work at the 2007 International Venice Biennale, he received a Golden Lion in exchange for his ethical and political commitment and for the survival of a six-decade lasting work. Ferrari exhibited his collage work for the L´Osservatore Romano series produced in 2001 and the sculpturing work entitled: La Civilización Occidental y Cristiana, (“Western-Christian Civilization”) created in 1965, which features a Jesus Christ crucified against an American bomber. Furthermore, the Biennale director, Robert Storr, has also invited the Argentine artist Guillermo Kuitca to take part in the core exhibition so that he may also exhibit his recently produced works, depicting a reference to other local artists such as Alfredo Hlito and Lucio Fontana.