| Adolfo
Nigro, a ´rioplatense´ painter
Nelly Perazzo
Extract from the book Adolfo Nigro, de Nelly
Perazzo, 1993, Editorial Fundación Gordon para el Desarrollo de
las Artes.
Artistic trainig: Buenos Aires,
Montevideo
Adolfo Nigro was born in Rosario City, Argentina, on September
22, 1942. He started painting when was about ten years old, together with
his twin brother, Jorge, a painter himself, "under the pleased eyes
and encouragement of my parents", in his own words. He recalls from
Rosario, his hometown, the relationship to the river, as well as country
images like haystacks, farms, cartwheels; stubborn presences of Water
and Earth in his work, which will never leave him. The look in his eyes
directed to the river unveil him the idea of change, of the erratic, of
the come and go, of the failure to stop. Many years later, he would refresh
these personal experiences when he visited Barcelona.
Once in Buenos Aires, Nigro studied at an evening school. When he was
fourteen years old, he entered the School of Fine Arts. Under the shelter
of teachers who guided and supported him, the artist consolidated his
trade, working on the underlying principles of the artistic phenomenon
to tackle it respectfully. When he recollects his teachers at the time,
his mind calls back the generosity of sculptor Aurelio Macchi, painter
Diana Chalukian, Héctor Nieto, Antonio Pujía and, last but
not least, painter Victor Magariños D., who led him to understand
modem painting and brought him near the ideas of Uruguayan painter Joaquín
Torres Garcia, a key figure in Latin-American art from the Southern Cone,
destined to be crucially important in Nigro's work Meanwhile, in order
to make a living in Buenos Aires, he engaged in most dissimilar jobs,
namely iron-and-steel workman, mason, greegrocer, truck driver, salesman
at the old Market Hall.
As far as his painting is concerned, in 1957 Nigro started a figurative
trend based upon diverse proposals. His drawings, as well as his oil and
tempera paintings, representing flowers, landscapes, still-lifes, portraits
or partial aspects of Nature, showed him hesitant between a realism strongly
adhered to the referent and more synthetic solutions, tending to structure
shapes through blots or lines, laying emphasis on plastic transposition
properly speaking. Two things derive from such studies and early works,
which can be noticed only in retrospect. First, the idea that art must
be closely linked to reality in the sense of environment, daily affairs,
immediacy as a starting point. Secondly, the fact that the artist must
work on the notion of entirety and fragment.
In 1966, Nigro decided to settle in Montevideo, where he met a group of
painters and craftsmen who lent him their moral support, their friendship
and something that had until then been impossible for him to attain, i.e.
their workshops. Thereafter, he stopped working against time and began
to produce works of art. Two significant events occurred when he arrived
in Uruguay. The former was his first one-man exhibition held, together
with Argentine painter Ernesto Drangosch, at "U" Gallery, in
Montevideo. Enrique Gómez, the Gallery Director, had been sponsoring
young artists for more than twenty years. The latter, and most critical
event, was his meeting Uruguayan painter josé Gurvich, a pupil
of Torres García.
Inhabited skies and horizons
In 1974, Adolfo Nigro was back in Buenos Aires. He fully
devoted himself to painting, neglecting craftsmanship which, however,
appeared again in his work by unheard-of ways.
Inhabited Skies: In his 1974 works, the subject of the city repeatedly
comes into view featuring aspects which can be seen from the roofs upwards,
as if the artist's eyes were placed at such level. Another peculiar trait
is the division into overlapping zones as, for instance, in "The
Port and the Village", where the borough appears in the upper area,
a little boat on the horizon in the central zone, and the port in the
lower part. Such division into horizontal strips is heralding the so-called
"Horizons" Series, which shall be produced two years later.
We can also see rising objects whirling above the city. Such objects,
which were originally jammed, become gradually loose in space. In the
oil painting entitled "The Box", Nigro shows that he not only
intends to people unlimited space, but also every hollow element appealing
to be filled or inhabited.
Nigro redeems the object connected with his own experiences, a true redemption
of memory. He recovers not only the visual element, but also the intensity
of recollections, enhanced by his personal fancy. The socalled "Inhabited
Skies" Series appeared in 1974 and extended, yet sporadically, until
1980. Nigro's organization of space usually started in the lower part
of the canvas, treating objects related to the urban landscape massively.
His imaginary city contained dissimilar references from the cities where
he had lived so far; i.e. Rosario, Buenos Aires, Montevideo. From such
part of the canvas, diverse objects start whirling upwards, thickening
around a central axis, until they rise towards the limits of the space
above. The objects that can be seen are always meaningful objects for
the artist. Therefore, they are unique and cannot be replaced, they have
a vital force of their own. They formally group in search of a specific
rhythm, unity, balance.
As Nigro himself has written:"The aproach to reality through everyday
objects has been a constant feature in my activity. The object became
the main character of my works, familiar objects sharing their post history.
When I projected myself into reality, Ithought of finding myself, thereby
coming to understand the meaning of things as a whole".
The subjet of earth
The Argentine art critic Abraham Haber once remarked that
Adolfo Nigro's themes turn around three of the four classical elements:
Earth, Water, Air. As from 1977, the subject of Earth gains decisive importance
in his artistic production. During his stay in Barcelona, his eyes turned
to Earth, had shaped his very close affinities with Miró; his feelings
about the country scenery, his plastic treatment, his sensitivity for
the immediate, his obsession for the horizon line, rhythmically repeated
in the furrows, his shift from strict realism to unrestrained fancy.
Ever since then, different thematical series have usually coexisted within
Nigro's oeuvre, touching upon rural and urban aspects; namely Horizons,
Inhabited Skies, Figures and Objects in Space. Some of these series appear
and prevail, others recede and vanish, still others forecast future developments.
In the 1977-1980 period, the subject of Earth came on the scene, introducing
customary objects; inter alia, "The Haystack is as Blue as the Sky",
"The Cart,"The Haystack and the Moon", "The Distance
of the Moon", "Green Field", "Blue Horizon",
"There Up the Hill", "The Harvest", "Cart and
Horizon", "The Moon and the Hill". Most of these works,
executed in either oil or acrylic paint, contain an outburst of blues,
reds, peculiar yellows masterly managed by Nigro in broad, contrastive
planes, with vivid accents suddenly catching the eye. Composition also
acts by opposing lower and higher zones, the earth and the sky, the cart
or the haystack and the moon.
The idea of inhabiting spaces is present at all times. A great number
of objects are distributed over the countryside or the sky. In addition,
these elements also people and inhabit bigger objects such as the cam
the moon which, in a hospitable fashion, become hollow to lodge Nigro's
living memories; i.e. corn sheaves, the fork, the wheel. As usual, horizontal
strips have time connotations; each phase stands for different remembrance
spells, for his own states of mind. As Nigro worked without devising any
plan in advance, objects were gradually shaped as an ever-increasing bunch,
which had to be solved by the artist from a plastic viewpoint. The guiding
principle was to tell the story of a point in time or a certain feeling
right through to the end.
The subjet of water
In 1980, Adolfo Nigro consolidated the subject of Water
amid a poetical arrangement of elements of Earth, i.e. hills and haystacks,
houses and carts. At the same time, the insistence on horizontality gradually
yielded to more varied rhythms.
Navigations The scenery of Aguas Dulces, an Uruguayan riverside spot where
Nigro used to spend his summer holidays with his family, and the production
of his first work on the "Navigations" theme, started to pave
a new way in his career. His palette acquires higher saturation in the
subject of the seashore, the hamlets, the bushes, the shells. Sometimes,
the boat "inhabits the moon", or the blocks of sand and water
are "inhabited" by shells, toads, and mollusks. Nocturnal moments
admit many colour shades, but waxy blue prevails in his palette.
The "Navigations" Series adds another formal innovation. In
order to show the mobility of Water, Nigro resorts to small characters
which are rhythmically contrasted and, therefore, gain an ever-increasing
plastic presence. These characters describe a weft which becomes even
stronger when the artist applies ink techniques, often combined with collage.
Calendars In 1981, the so-called "Calendars" Series came to
enhance Nigro's artistic output. In these works, a thick, red-coloured
area seems to set the rules of the compositional game, which may reach
the panel edges or remain firmly anchored to the central area of the picture.
The objects which go into and come out of such block define a highly profuse
surface and contrast diverse, striking details against the coloured unit.
In this period, Nigro made use of different resources, inter alia, setting
an opposition between net planes and the dim outline of blots; using collage
for the central block which was then painted; introducing loose elements
after overcoming his introvert nature and opening up his mind to new proposals.
Nigro's recurrence on the subject of Time takes a novel form in the "Calendars"
Series. References to the actual calendar -days of the week, the hour,
days of the month, the clock?relate to a past history, they definitely
mark the passage of time. Days seem to detach gradually from a block calendar,
as if they were leaves failing from a tree, thereby implying painful time
connotations at different levels.
Nigro's stature as a painter
Nigro's painting has always kept apart from the customary
patterns sanctioned by established circles. He has never worried about
coming into contact with powerful groups acting at international level
or within Argentina's cultural milieu. Nor has he been interested in drawing
the attention of well-known characters. His painting has always been alien
to changing fashions and wordly trends. Although receptive, his oeuvre
has always paid heed to its own inner coherence, to the rigourous pursuit
of the artist, at all times eager to grasp the sole, peculiar vibration
which made him feel the flow of life and art.
Yet fairly abreast of the times, this circumstance made Nigro's oeuvre
appear to be lonely, restrained, deprived of a context rendering it self-evident.
Nigro is an epitome of the artist who keeps aloof, who protects his creative
privacy. For such reason, only if we examine his works consistently with
their continuity and coherence, shall we discover their spiritual stature
as a whole, and their current significance as complete oeuvre. Nigro has
attained a pictorial language which draws its raison d'etre from itself.
It needn't come out of its contextual autonomy to assert its strength.
Its assertion originates in a code which, handled vigorously and meaningfully,
was acquired by the artist after long years of looking attentively upon
the pulse of life.
A Time and the Object. Nigro's present-day oeuvre is affected by deep
changes arising from his concern about the theme of the object, the course
of time, and the elements. Everyday objects, which Marcel Brion has described
as "having the simple solidity of things which are useful, whose
function is modest and accurate" have left the imprint of their meaningful
speech in Nigro's works. At a first stage, objects were the referent,
a compulsory starting point to apprehend a language which would enable
him to access plastic autonomy.
At a second stage, objects began to imply something else, which went beyond
themselves, and they became agents of revelation. The oneiric, memories,
dreams began to weave a weft in Nigro's works, where there was a possibility
to connect reality with wonder and make the biographical object "an
everyday affair turned into a thing", in Violette Morin's words.
At that time, through the valuable metaphors of Surrealism, Nigro's lyrical
and poetical relationship with the object reaches very high levels. Finally,
at a third stage, he abandoned his sensitivity for the immediate object.
There are threatening elements, dramatic oppositions revealing deeper
conflict, greater contradiction. Multiple focal points and lavish profusion
mark a step into what is clearly intelligible at dark levels of the unconscious.
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