Antonio Lopez

In the summer of 2011 the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza will be holding a comprehensive exhibition of the work of the Spanish artist Antonio Lopez (born Tomelloso, 1936). It will feature oil paintings, drawings and sculptures of some of his most typical subjects such as the interior, the human figure, landscapes and urban views, principally of Madrid, as well as depictions of fruit. In the reality that surrounds him Lopez looks for everyday aspects that he can reproduce in his work, using a slow, highly meditated creative process that aims to capture the essence of the object or landscape epicted.

The last retrospective exhibition of the work of Antonio Lopez took place in 1993. In the two intervening decades, the artist has continued to evolve and has produced some of his most significant masterworks. The purpose of this exhibition is to present to the public his most recent production and, from that standpoint, to offer a reinterpretation of the artist’s earlier career. The first part of the exhibition explores the major subjects in Antonio Lopez’s works from the last decades, indicating at the same time points of continuity and contrasts with the period before 1990. Those subjects may be reduced essentially to three: the city, trees, and the human figure, manifested in three fundamental media (painting, drawing and sculpture). The second part of the exhibition offers a retrospective overview of Antonio Lopez’s career, from its beginnings to his early mature period. The emphasis is on the human figure, which at another time predominated in the artist’s production.

Many of the works in the present exhibition have been loaned fromo private collections, mostly in Spain, including that of the artist himself. A large number of them have never been published or exhibited and some are still unfinished. There are also important loans from institutions such as the Centro de Arte Reina Sofía (Madrid), the Museo de Bellas Artes of Bilbao, the Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris), the Hamburger Kunsthalle (Hamburg) and the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. The exhibition is completed by the projection in one of the galleries of two documentaries made specifically for this occassion. They include images of Lopez working this year, both in his studio an outdoors as well as various interviews by individuals close to him.

After its showing in Madrid, the exhibition will be seen in a reduced version at the Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, from 10 October 2011 to 22 January 2012.

Antonio Lopez Garcia

Stationen:
28.06.2011 - 25.09.2011 Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid
10.10.2011 - 22.01.2012 Museo de Bellas Artes Bilbao