Concrete Cuba: Cuban Geometric Abstraction from the 1950s

Description

The development of Cuban geometric abstraction and, specifically, the formation of Los Diez Pintores Concretos (Ten Concrete Painters), coincided with the radical political and cultural shifts that raged throughout the country in the 1950s. Cuba experienced rising nationalist sentiments instigated in part by the influx of US tourism and material goods. Against this vibrant backdrop, artists sought a new visual language in which art, specifically abstract art, could function as political and social practice. Concrete Cuba, produced on the occasion of the 2015-2016 exhibition at David Zwirner, marks one of the first major presentations outside Cuba to focus exclusively on concretism in Cuba during the 1950s, and includes important works from the late 1940s through the early 1960s by the 12 artists who were at different times associated with the short-lived group: Pedro Alvarez, Wifredo Arcay, Mario Carreno, Salvador Corratge, Sandu Darie, Luis Martinez Pedro, Alberto Menocal, Jose M. Mijares, Pedro de Oraa, Jose Angel Rosabal, Lolo Soldevilla, and Rafael Soriano. The catalogue features an extensively researched chronology, compiled by art historian Susanna Temkin, tracking the development of the period artistically and politically from 1939 through 1968. New scholarship by Cuban art specialist Abigail McEwen offers an interpretative framework for this group of painters, and a deeper understanding of the forces behind the development of concretism's Cuban strain. A limited edition of 100 copies will be published as well, and will come with one of five signed and numbered prints by Pedro de Oraa. These five unique prints are based on works completed during the height of de Oraa's Concrete period in the 1950s. In contrast to his later works in which forms were modified by expanding and stretching an image taken from an original draft, these works are true to the original drafts created in the 1950s and follow strict principles of Concretism. In keeping with the works from the exhibition Concrete Cuba at David Zwirner in 2015, de Oraa's five limited edition prints remain loyal to the spirit of the decade from which they are inspired.

Abigail McEwen is associate professor of Latin American art at the University of Maryland, College Park. She received her PhD from the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, in 2010, and joined the faculty at the University of Maryland that year. She is an affiliated faculty member of the Latin American Studies Center. McEwen's own book, Revolutionary Horizons: Art and Polemics in 1950s Cuba, is forthcoming in 2016 from Yale University Press. Susanna Temkin is assistant curator at the Americas Society/Council of the Americas, New York. She earned her PhD from the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, where her research focused on modern art in the Americas. Her doctoral dissertation centered on Marcelo Pogolotti, a key figure from the first generation of modern artists in Cuba and a participant in the international avant-garde.

"[A] hundred-plus pages of high-quality color plates... the first such chronology published in English... a valuable resource."--Dana Hart "Watson Library, The Metropolitan Museum of Art" "[The] richness in the catalog lies in the hundred-plus pages of high quality color plates...and the illustrated chronology by Susanna Temkin, Assistant Curator at the Americas Society and Council of the Arts. Temkin has laid out a chronology of Cuban Concrete art from 1939 to 1963, and includes biographies on twelve artists from the movement. This is the first such chronology published in English, and is a valuable resource."--Dana Hart "ARLIS/NA Reviews" "Highlights were Sandu Darie's playful sculpture and painting; his works' subdued palette felt distinctively local, the deep browns, auburns, and yellows conveying a rich, earthy materiality."--Grace Wales Bonner "Artforum, Best of 2016" "Interest in Cuban art will continue to grow, and Concrete Cuba's illustrations and chronology will be essential to art historians and curators in the coming years."--Dana Hart "ARLIS/NA Reviews"