Lot 113: GEGO

GEGO 1912 - 1994 RETICULÁREA stainless steel wire 104 by 43 by 37cm.; 41 by 17 by 14 1/2 in. Executed in 1969.

Lourdes de Lima Collection, Caracas
Acquired directly from the above by the present owner in 2004

This work is accompanied by a certificate of authenticity from the Fundación GEGO



Executed in 1969, Reticulárea displays the striking optical explorations and spatial geometrics for which Gertrudis Goldschmidt (known as Gego) was renowned. The sculpture is an example from the celebrated Reticuláreas series, which Gego first created as a commission for the Museo de Bellas Artes in Caracas in 1968, and which she continued until the mid 1970s. The name derived from reticula, meaning 'grid', and was coined by the Venezuelan critic Roberto Guevara when Gego was fabricating her large 'environment piece' which combined several hanging parts that collectively filled an entire room at the museum. A complex yet penetrable metallic web of positive and negative spaces was created, through which the viewer had to navigate. The name stuck, and all works which subsequently derived from that installation were named Reticuláreas after it. For Gego, line was the most enduring and important element to explore and embrace: it was her muse, and in her hands became an almost autonomous entity. Her use of repetition and layering created an endless entanglement in these complex structures; one is able to see entry points to her creations yet is never able to find the exit points.

As seen in the present stunning example, Gego's Reticulárea is, in essence, a matrix of structural co-dependency, and is clearly created with the spectator in mind. Anchored and hanging in mid air, Reticulárea is an ephemeral self-contained environment that transforms the space it occupies. As Iris Peruga states, "the spectator is invited to enter it, to be a part of it, and to complete it [...] the artwork proposes a reunification with living space by facilitating the viewer's integration with it" (Iris Peruga, "Gego: From Matter to Space: The Game of Creation or Creation as Game?" Questioning the Line: Gego in context, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, 2003, p. 63). In the present work, the irregular metal lines both reflect and refract light, the contours interweaving to create a subtle sense of movement. Gego used aluminium and steel for the series, the lightness and fragility of these materials resulting in a gentle rhythmic swing, which in turn casts shadows that bounce off the walls in a spatial experience which is constantly in flux.

With Reticulárea, Gego transcends the postmodern notions of alienation and isolation by coercing the viewer to not stand outside her environment, but within it and experience the fragility and universality of its very existence. For Gego, the element of line describes the dualities of tension and order, of mobility and patterned rhythm. Gego's body of highly refined abstract work which created poetry in geometric forms, and her masterful and innovative manipulation of space, places her firmly at the forefront of South American modernism.