ART CITIES:Athens-Paolo Colombo
Paolo Colombo (born 1949, Turin, Italy) is an international art curator and living in Athens since 2008, as an artist, he is working exclusively with watercolors and pencil drawings and was the first European artist to show in MoMA P.S.1. In early 80s Colombo got interested in curating and since then his curatorial practice
By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Bernier/Eliades Gallery Archive
The formative years of Paolo Colombo’s painting and drawing practice were self-taught, exploring simple principles of line, form and color. His art practice grew with his writing, incorporating text into his works on paper and carrying the evocative visuals of his poetry into his artwork. In the 1980s, he moved into a more illustrative practice drawing from personal experience and using motifs of hands, animals and figures. Colombo’s final exhibition before a long hiatus was in 1986 in a group exhibition at the Pensylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia. From this point, he went on to have a career as a Curator in museums in the United States, Switzerland, Italy, Greece and Turkey. Paolo Colombo returns to Bernier/Eliades Gallery with a solo exhibition entitled “Selected Works”. In his new exhibition he presents a series of large watercolors based on poems from his book published by Agra in 2014, as well as recent yet to be published poems. The paintings often appear as large swaths of fabric, mimicking the warp and weft of the material, and rendered by countless lines of watercolor, on which texts emerge as tightly executed embroideries on surfaces of gauze or organdy. The exhibition also features 12 smaller works painted in geometric patterns, often reminding us of mosaic tassels. The smaller works have a strict painterly approach, and are worked with much attention to composition and texture. Paolo Colombo almost exclusively employs watercolors and drawing; they have been his constant media since he began his practice in 1971.
Paolo Colombo received a degree in languages and literature from the University of Rome in 1975. He is Art Advisor at the Istanbul Museum of Modern Art since 2008. He has recently curated the exhibition “Ed Ruscha. Mixmaster” for the Pinacoteca Agnelli in Torino. He was a curator for the 2nd Mardin Biennale in 2012 and a curator for the 3rd Thessaloniki Biennial, in 2011. From 2001 to 2007 was Curator of The Museo Nazionale delle Arti del XXI Secolo in Rome. From 1989 to 2000 he was Director of the Centre d’art contemporain in Geneva. In 1999 he curated the 6th Istanbul Biennial. Among the exhibitions he curated are In Praise of Shadows, Apocalittici e Integrati,–contemporary Italian Art (2007), Ed Ruscha (2004) Margherita Manzelli (2003), Francis Alÿs (2002), Michael Raedecker (2002), Zaha Hadid (2002), Haluk Akakçe (2001), Kara Walker (2000), Arturo Herrera (2000), Christopher Wool (1999), Olaf Breuning (1999), Gillian Wearing (1998), Jane e Louise Wilson (1998), Fatto in Italia: Contemporary Art from Italy (1997), Pipilotti Rist (1996), Ugo Rondinone (1996), Tony Oursler (1995), Rosemarie Trockel (1994), Giovanni Anselmo (1993), Juan Munoz (1991), Kiki Smith (1991), Robert Gober (1988), Carroll Dunham (1988). He has been associate producer of a number of award winning films, more recently The Edge of Heaven and Soul Kitchen by Fatih Akin, and The Tree by Julie Bertuccelli, starring Charlotte Gainsbourg.
Info: Bernier/Eliades Gallery, 11 Eptachalkou Street, Thission, Athens, Duration: 16/1-15/2/20, Days & Hours: Tue-Fri 10:30-18:30, Sat 12:00-16:00, https://bernier-eliades.com
