Lynne Cooke on Rosemarie Trockel: a cosmos May 2012 Conversation with Lynne Cooke, the curator of the exhibition devoted to the German artist Rosemarie Trockel. Trockel's work explores different methods and a wide range of materials, thereby eluding classification. Her creations question the legitimizing categories of art, social order and gender identities. Also, in this collection, Trockel gives her attention to lesser known artists, chosen out of the empathy she feels for the frankness and inventiveness with which they look at questions that she too asks herself. Exhibitions
Hans Haacke Castles in the air March 2012 In this video, Walter Grasskamp, art historian and critic, and Hans Haacke himself present the exhibition Castles in the air. Associated with North American conceptual art and a pioneer of what is known as institutional critique, Haacke, through his work, questions museum, political and economic institutions in the context of today's globalized society. Exhibitions
Nacho Criado Collaborating Agents July 2012 Nacho Criado (Mengíbar, Jaén, 1943 – Madrid, 2010) is considered one of the most important figures in the last 40 years of experimental art in Spain. The Palacio de Velázquez, one of the Museum's venues in Parque del Retiro, offers a retrospective of his work, providing insight into the multitude of media, practices and homages present in his art, and also their material realization. The Palacio de Cristal, the other Reina Sofía venue in the park and the second site of the retrospective, reconstructs the 1991 exhibition Piezas de agua y cristal, where cultivated mushrooms exemplify the 'collaborating agents' that give this exhibition its name. Exhibitions
Interview with Teresa Velázquez: Lygia Pape. Magnetized Space June 2011 Teresa Velázquez, curator of the exhibition, presents the work of the Brazilian Lygia Pape, an artist closely linked to the Neo-Concrete movement, which appeared as part of the strong current of renovation and modernism that swept Brazil in the 1950s. This exhibition shows the multidisciplinary nature of the artist's work, in terms of both themes and formats, which range from film to performance art and from painting to books, among others. Exhibitions
Interview with Frances Morris: Yayoi Kusama May 2011 In this retrospective, Frances Morris, head of international collections at Tate Modern and curator of the exhibition, presents the work of the Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, an essential figure in contemporary, post-war art. The exhibition allows visitors to get to know her multiple facets, from her contacts with Pop art, to her art installations and interventions in public spaces. Exhibitions
Interview with Jon Bird: Leon Golub May 2011 Jon Bird, curator of the Leon Golub exhibition, explores the contemporary relevance of the artist's painting from various perspectives. First of all, how it brings historical painting up to date; secondly, how it conceives of the body; and thirdly, what the role of the viewer is. Exhibitions
Efrén Álvarez. Económicos March 2011 Económicos, the exhibition by the artist Efrén Álvarez (Barcelona, 1980), outlines a global vision of today's economy as a discipline that caricaturizes itself. Forty drawings and texts by different authors show relationship systems in which the apparent pedagogical intention of the exhibition entails, in practice, looking at what is unproductive, decayed and alienated through work and consumption Exhibitions
Interview with Jorge Ribalta, A hard, merciless light. The worker-photography movement, 1926-1939 April 2011 In this interview Jorge Ribalta, the curator of the exhibition A hard, merciless light. The worker-photography movement, 1926-1939, proposes a journey through the documentary practices of the worker movements of the interwar period, emphasizing the appearance of a new notion of photographic modernism, one linked to social movements and the document Exhibitions
Roberto Jacoby and Ana Longoni on Desire rises from Collapse March 2011 Roberto Jacoby is an artist who, through his multiple abandonments of art, nourishes the artistic practice of possibility, moments of tension and new agents. His work begins in the realm of Instituto Di Tella and, in a series of radical episodes, becomes Tucumán Arde (1968). Far from ending there, his subsequent career has dealt with networks, memory and its activations (or obliterations) in the archive. Exhibitions
Ricardo Piglia, on Roberto Jacoby February 2011 The novelist Ricardo Piglia talks about the work of the Argentine artist Roberto Jacoby, in connection with the exhibition Roberto Jacoby, Desire rises from Collapse (Museo Reina Sofía, 25 February to 30 May, 2011). Jacoby's work, explains Piglia, contributes to the formation of two of today's key ideas: the creation of networks, through what Jacoby calls technologies of friendship, and the notion of immateriality as a fundamental aspect of contemporary society. Exhibitions
Asier Mendizabal January 2011 In much of the work by Asier Mendizabal (Ordizia, 1973) history ceases to be a practice linked to the past and instead reveals the cracks through which it becomes an activity intimately connected to the present. In this interview he comments on some of his work, hermetic and complex, where the resource of narration becomes something that updates both history and its visual forms. The ideas of monument, public sculpture and photomontage are modern archetypes that Mendizabal uses as a possibility of that which is collective. Exhibitions
Daina Augaitis and Antoni Muntadas on Entre/Between December 2011 Conversation with Daina Augatis, curator of the exhibition, and the artist Antoni Muntadas on Entre/Between. This exhibition, structured into nine blocks or "thematic constellations" is a complex, non-linear reading of Muntadas' work. In it numerous collaborative and multi-disciplinary projects are shown, from the early years to the piece Situación 2011, created especially for this exhibition. Exhibitions
Soledad Sevilla. Written in the celestial bodies November 2011 Conversation with the artist Soledad Sevilla about her exhibition in the Palacio de Cristal, in Madrid's Parque del Retiro, where she created an installation specifically for this site. Language, geometry, light and the spectator's experience are some of the elements that contribute to this exhibition. A large aluminum structure and a series of polycarbonate panels recreate a night sky dotted with linguistic signs. Exhibitions
João Fernandes and François Piron on the exhibition Locus Solus. Impressions of Raymond Roussel November 2011 João Fernandes and François Piron, the exhibition curators, analyse the influence of Raymond Roussel, an essential figure in the history of literature and a source of inspiration for visual artists and authors from other disciplines. The legacy of Roussel's poetic-literary universe permits a transversal reading of the history of 20th century art. Exhibitions
Manuel J. Borja-Villel and Elena Asins on the exhibition Fragments of memory October 2011 Manuel J. Borja-Villel, the exhibition curator, presents the artist Elena Asins' work and discusses the key elements of her role and her contributions to the history of art. In addition, the artist herself contextualizes her work following her collaboration with the Computation Centre, and analyses the multiple media and formats used in her artwork (concrete poetry, drawing, video...). Exhibitions