MILAN GRYGAR

P420 is pleased to announce the second solo show by the artist Milan Grygar (b.1926, Zvolen, Slovakia, lives and works in Prague).

For about half a century, starting in the mid-1960s, Milan Grygar has developed an oeuvre whose premise is the indivisible nature of the two senses occidental art has often considered separately: sight and hearing. His works are essentially linked to sound: they visually record its progress or constitute more or less detailed scores for its production.

While the first show at the gallery (Sound on Paper, 2014) presented works from the 1960s and 1970s connected with aural, visual and performative experimentation (Acoustic Drawings, Sound Plastic Drawings and Linear Scores), the exhibition that opens on 23 September in Bologna features recent works, including large canvases from the Antiphon series and watercolors on paper.

In 1996 the artist began the series entitled Antiphon, reflecting a dualism constantly balanced between visual and aural space. The canvases, which approach the relationship between sound and color in the alternation of harmony and dissonance, are often diptychs with minimal or monochromatic compositions – first with dark colors, then with increasingly bright ones in recent years – which create a strong spatial relationship.

Milan Grygar (b. 1926 in Zvolen, Slovakia, lives and works in Prague) is considered one of the most authoritative artists of the Czech Republic, as well as one of the most interesting figures on an international level in the field of experimentation between visual art and contemporary sound research.

Recent solo shows include MILAN GRYGAR / SVĚTLO, ZVUK, POHYB at Fair Gallery in Brno (2017), Milan Grygar: Sound on Paper, ZKM, Karlsruhe (2016), Cage/Grygar: Chance Operations & Intention, Ludwig Museum, Koblenz (2015); Milan Grygar: Light Sound Movement, Today Art Museum, Beijing (2012).

Group shows include: Art in Europe 1945-1968: Facing The Future, ZKM, Karlsruhe (2016); 11th Biennale of Contemporary Art, Lyon (2011); New Sensitivity, National Art Museum of China (NAMOC), Beijing (2010); Beyond Geometry: Experiments in Form, 1940s-1970s, LACMA, Los Angeles and Miami Art Museum, Miami (2004).