The Bancaja Foundation presented the El Paso exhibition yesterday at its headquarters in Valencia, an exhibition that reviews the decisive contribution of this artistic group to the renewal of Spanish art at the end of the 1950s in the 20th century. The presentation included the participation of the president of the Bancaja Foundation, Rafael Alcón, and the curator of the exhibition, Lola Durán.
The exhibition brings together 72 works by the ten artists who are members of the group: Rafael Canogar, Martín Chirino, Luis Feito, Juana Francés, Manuel Millares, Manuel Rivera, Antonio Saura, Pablo Serrano, Antonio Suárez and Manuel Viola. A group that, nearly 70 years after its constitution, constitutes one of the most relevant projects to date in the exhibition of the work of this artistic collective, which represented a revolution in the lethargic Spanish creative panorama of the time.
The exhibition has managed to bring together pieces whose creation focuses on the years of activity of the group from its constitution in 1957 to its dissolution in 1960, revealing the plastic expression of their creative restlessness while they shared the collective commitment to break with the prevailing artistic canons. The exhibition also includes some of the group’s most important works that were part of the leading international exhibitions they participated in during that period.
The works presented come from nearly 30 institutional and private collections such as the collections of relatives and successors of the artists, the Institut Valencià d’Art Modern (IVAM), the Aragonese Institute of Contemporary Art and Culture-IAACC Pablo Serrano, MACVAC- Museu d’Art Contemporani Vicente Aguilera Cerni de Vilafamés, Contemporary Art Collection “la Caixa” Foundation, CaixaBank Collection, Legacy of Juana Mordó (Madrid Circle of Fine Arts Heritage), Víctor Balaguer Museum Library, Guillermo de Osma Gallery, Mariano Yera Collection , Fernán-Gómez Contemporary Art Collection, Javier Lacruz Collection, Antonio Cátedra Collection, Azahar Global Capital, among others.
The exhibition group brings together the different disciplines that the group’s authors worked on: painting, with oil pieces and mixed technique that combines the use of pigment with other materials such as wire mesh, wire or metal; drawing, with pieces in Indian ink, drawing or gouache on paper; and sculpture in materials such as iron or stone. A diverse legacy that reflects the uniqueness of each creator, channeled into a common vision and impulse of criticism and opposition to classical canons.
The exhibition is completed with a compilation of original documentation about the group, some of its main editions and publications and copies of catalogs of the exhibitions in which they participated.
The creation of El Paso occurred between 1955 and 1956. In February 1957 the group was formed in Madrid and a month later the Manifesto was published, written by the art critic José Ayllón and signed by all the members of the group, which declared in its first lines the shared will to “invigorate contemporary Spanish art, which has such brilliant antecedents, but which at the present time, lacks constructive criticism, ‘marchands’, exhibition halls that guide the public and “some fans who support any innovative attitude are going through an acute crisis.”
El Paso’s first exhibition occurred in April 1957 at the Buchholz Gallery in Madrid. Along with its activity of agitating the artistic scene in Spain and shaping the post-war Spanish avant-garde, the collective had the opportunity to contribute to international dissemination with its participation in important international exhibitions such as the Sao Paulo Biennial (1957), the Biennial of Venice (1958) and the exhibition New Spanish Painting and Sculpture (1960) at the MoMA in New York. The collective’s last exhibition before its dissolution took place in October 1960 at the L’Attico gallery in Rome.
On the occasion of the exhibition, a catalog will be published that includes the reproduction of the works that are part of the exhibition, accompanied by texts from the curator and the art critic Alfonso de la Torre. Within the cultural and artistic mediation program, the Bancaja Foundation offers guided tours for the general public and groups led by an expert specialist in art and cultural mediation.
The El Paso exhibition can be visited at the headquarters of the Bancaja Foundation in Valencia (Plaza Tetuán, 23) from April 5 to September 8, 2024.
