Bancaja Foundation. Pl. Tetouan, s/n
Andreu Alfaro was one of the most important artists in Spanish art of the 20th century and the Bancaja Foundation wants to recognize that with this retrospective that covers more than fifty years of his career, of 1958 even 2000. His most recognizable work, public sculpture, it appears only as an example at the entrance of the building (Tribute to Plato) and in video format, the rest is small and medium sized sculpture that goes back to his early years associated with the Parpalló group, at a time when modernity was emerging in Spain from the hand of Saura, Chillida or Tàpies. like them, Alfaro politicized his work between the years 1960 i 1973 (the piece Tothomit is a cry in favor of collectivity), leaving aside the abstract constructivism of simple forms, and then he came out with his most applauded pieces, generative lessons. That is to say, curved surfaces created by the juxtaposition of straight rods, like public sculpture Tribute to Ausiàs March which we can see in the Royal Gardens. All are a real wonder. Then it went through a stage of colored methacrylate, of fooling around with the baroque and exalting the jazz, to end up in Contraminimalism, in the last room of this chronological tour where we find the elegant metal plates that make up Of life and death, the memory. Alfaro will be an artist with overflowing imagination who never stopped surprising in the search for new materials (aluminum, wood, marble…), perspectives i geometries, that ran away from coherence, predictability and uniformity without fear of failure. S.M.
