Jesús Rafael Soto

Galerie Denise René-Hans Mayer, Krefeld

Private Collection, Belgium

Acquired from the above by the present owner in 2010

Krefeld, Galerie Denise René-Hans Mayer, Masterpieces of Modern Art, October - November 1969 

Colour: The colour in the catalogue illustration is fairly accurate, although the whites are warmer in the original. Condition: Please refer to the department for a professional condition report.
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“The immaterial is the sensory reality of the universe. Art is the sensory knowledge of the immaterial. To become conscious of the immaterial in its state of pure structure, is to make the final leap towards the absolute.”

(Jesús Rafael Soto in conversation with Claude-Louis Renard, in: Exh. Cat., New York, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Soto: A Retrospective Exhibition, 1974, p. 19)

 

Masterfully fusing painting, sculpture, and architecture into one triumphant work, Carrés sur la Diagonale (Squares on the Diagonal) by Jesús Rafael Soto is an exceptional example from the artist’s seminal output of geometric abstract paintings from the 1950s and 1960s. Reduced to a subtle palette of carefully orchestrated colours, the Minimalist aesthetic of the present work is compounded by the repetition of black iron blocks (Carrés) that are superimposed along the vertical axis of the work. Reducing the chromatic spectrum to black and white, Soto achieves a simplicity in tonal and formal composition that gives way to a complexity of spatial and optical effects that imbue this work with its extraordinary sense of movement. Similar to artists such as Bridget Riley and Victor Vasarely, Soto explored the relationship between black and white to create rhythmic dynamics that challenge the nature of vision and perception. Whilst Riley and Vasarely used the parameters of the two-dimensional canvas to create phantasmagorical optical distortions, Soto extended his artistic practice from the second to the third dimension, thereby incorporating physical space into his paintings. His appropriation of space through the use of geometric constructions positioned the artist at the very forefront of the post-war avant-garde. As one of the leading proponents of Op and Kinetic Art, Soto’s exceptional oeuvre is suffused by the notion of relentless experimentation beyond the spheres of traditional space and media.

The extraordinarily prolific years of the 1950s and 1960s not only resulted in some of the artist’s most celebrated works but also led him to develop his kinetic constructions further by using industrial and synthetic materials such as iron, nylon, Perspex, steel, and industrial paint. Soto’s distinctive aesthetic and rigorously inventive approach to art is certainly rooted in his biography. Born in Venezuela in 1923, Soto moved to Paris in the early 1950s aged 27 where he encountered the works of leading avant-garde artists such as Alexander Calder and Marcel Duchamp. Deeply influenced by the works of Piet Mondrian, to whom the inverted quadratic shape of the present work pays homage, Soto set out to create extensive three-dimensional forms that were utterly revolutionary in their illusory effect. In its intricate sense of space and movement, the present work already predicts his later kinetic relief constructions, which would gradually metamorphose into autonomous environments.

In Carrés sur la Diagonale, the idea of space is embedded within the work through its three-dimensional elements and further enforced by the viewer’s position in front of the work. Similar to the artist’s immersive sculptures, here the spectator is turned into a participant, as they respond to a myriad of complex perspectival changes within the picture plane. As a leading proponent of Op art, Soto participated in the seminal 1955 exhibition Le mouvement (The Movement) at Galerie Denise René in Paris, which effectively launched Kinetic art. Representing Venezuela at the Venice Biennale in 1966, the same year that Lucio Fontana exhibited his revolutionary tagli in the Italian Pavilion, Soto increasingly gained international reputation. It is during this defining period that Soto’s art oscillated between geometric and organic forms, creating some of his most audacious and visually enticing works. Curators Tatiana Cuevas and Paola Santoscoy reflected on this pivotal period: “His interest in abstraction and purity of form – issues that had been explored decades earlier by Cubism, Constructivism and Suprematism – led Soto to develop a kinetic language structured by the superimposition of compositional elements capable of lending optical movement to the pictorial plane” (Tatiana Cuevas and Paola Santoscoy, ‘Vision in Motion’, in: Exh. Cat., Mexico City, Museo Tamayo Arte Contemporáneo (and travelling), Jesús Rafael Soto: Vision in Motion, 2005-07, p. 15).

Situated at the highpoint of Soto’s early oeuvre, Carrés sur la Diagonale is an exceptional work that combines the geometry of Mondrian with a revolutionary approach to painting as a trigger for spatial perception and movement. Proposing three-dimensional alternatives to create a new sense of aesthetic harmony, the reduced intervention of selective compositional elements creates a polyphony of optical illusions that position the artist at the very height of experiential abstraction.