Gregorio Vardanega

Gregorio Vardanega was a painter and sculptor born in Italy. Because his family migrated to live in Argentina, from the age of three his formal education was there, and he eventually studied in Buenos Aires at the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes. He also won gold medals in Argentina and Brussels; during the Exposition of Visual Art and the International and Universal Exposition, respectively. Gregorio Vardanega worked in acrylic glass and overlapping wires making structures. He also worked with kinetic art, and it is the artworks in this medium which are his most famous expressions. He was fascinated with moving, colored lights and their interaction with geometric, kinetic sculptures. He considered his work to be architectural in essence and hoped that his towers of lights, metal and glass might become large installation pieces in the future. He art shows attention to the urban landscape and how it might be transformed through art. One of Gregorio Vardanega's most highly regarded pieces is Tour Orthogonale, 1987; a vividly colorful tower of aluminum, Plexiglass and a motor. Another is Multiplication Electronique II, Ed. 2, 1966 made of Plexiglass, wood, light bulbs and motor. Gregorio Vardanega is associated with other kinetic artists including his wife, Martha Boto, and friends Carlos Cruz-Diez and Jesus Soto. Boto and Vardanega called the kind of artistic research they were doing “chromocinetism”. This reflects their interest, and that of society at the time, in outer space, scientific exploration; things unknown, and how movement, lights, colors and their art could reflect those social forces. The two continued to remain in contact with Argentinian artists from the group Arte Nuevo and MADI when Gregorio Vardanega returned to live in Paris in 1959, which was also the year he met Martha Boto.