Artium Museoa is dedicating an extensive exhibition to the work of the artist Rafael Lafuente (Vitoria-Gasteiz, 1936-2005) as part of its 20th anniversary programme.

Rafael Lafuente explored what it means to make painting over a fifty-year period. The artist worked with series to develop a pure geometric language as part of an ongoing process of elimination and formal purification. Colour, line, plane, composition as well as pictorial techniques and various formats were not elements to be mastered, but partners with which to establish a working relationship, accountable for the result of the work. His work maintained this open dialogue throughout his career by constant research and experimentation that tied his work to the development of artistic languages and discourses deployed by international currents.

The project examines artistic practices in our context in the final decades of the past century, in which Rafael Lafuente was prominent for his research and work independent from the conventions and discourses at the time. 

Alongside emblematic works from the Artium Museoa Collection, the bulk of the exhibition comes from the artist’s own studio, a collection of documents and works that have been recovered and conserved by the painter’s family and in many cases displayed for the first time.

On teh occasion of the opening, the museum is organising a conversation between Gorka Lafuente, Gorka Basterrtexea and Enrique Martínez.

List of works (pdf) Publication