BELLAS ARTES PRESS RELEASE FOR ART MIAMI 2011
Since the establishment of the gallery in 1981, Bellas Artes has championed a diverse manifestation of
beauty. In 2001, Robert Kushner curated an exhibition for the gallery titled Beauty Without Regret. This
theme seems even more important in our turbulent times. Therefore, for its exhibition at Art Miami 2011,
Bellas Artes has chosen four artists, each of whose work has been shown by the gallery for at least twenty
years, to make a presentation that focuses on the concept of creating beauty in different forms, media and
styles.
Bellas Artes has exhibited the masterful tapestries and fiber sculptures of Columbian artist Olga de
Amaral for twenty five years. The artist is known for her architectural and sculptural constructions that “
turn textiles into golden surfaces of light”. By using linen coated with gesso, colored pigments and gold
and silver leaf, she constructs fibers to create an ethereal luminosity that produces imaginary landscapes
inspired by Columbian native architecture, Precolumbian textiles and gold artifacts, ornamentation of
Spanish colonial churches as well as abstract geometries. Works will be presented from her two recent
series : Pueblos and Policromos.
Ruth Duckworth, who died at the age of 90 in 2009, has been represented by the gallery since 1986. She
was one of the most innovative and important ceramic sculptors of the twentieth century. Manipulating
clay like a sculptor, not like a potter, she became an “alchemist of abstraction”, creating forms based on
shapes and patterns found in the human body and the natural world. In her 2010 review in Art in America,
Harmony Hammond stated that “Duckworth’s abstract nature-based forms are reductive, condensed and
refined, with an air of unapologetic elegance”. Porcelain, stoneware and bronze sculptures as well as
porcelain wall reliefs will be shown in Miami.
Robert Kushner, who emerged in the 1970s as a performance artist and a founder of the Pattern and
Decoration movement, first appeared at Bellas Artes in 1991. By then, he was known for his conceptually
sophisticated paintings of flowers. Alexandra Anderson-Spivy’s 2007 review in artnet Magazine stated “
Now that modernist disdain for representation has become largely irrelevant, his maverick dedication to
nature, his random placement of motifs, his mastery of materials as diverse as mica, gold leaf and the
always contentious glitter, his geometric splintering of space and his assimilation of non-Western
esthetics, make his work increasingly pertinent in this era of baroque pluralism”. His paintings on canvas
and paper will be shown by Bellas Artes.
Judy Pfaff, represented by the gallery for twenty years, started her career as a painter, yet her work
evolved into large scale sculptural installations which pioneered the beginning of installation art in the
1970s. Also well known for her complex dimensional drawings, prints and wall constructions, her
influence resonates through the work of many young artists today. In the 7/8/11 Albuquerque Journal,
Malin Wilson-Powell described a wall construction as “ a masterpiece in the lineage of collage that like
all of Pfaff’s work has so many art-world and real-world references and a level of nuance that makes it a
long-term engine of interest”. Bellas Artes will be presenting such a wall construction as well as threedimensional drawings.
The work of all these artists is represented in the major museums of the world.
For further information and photographs, please contact :
Charlotte Kornstein
Bellas Artes 653 Canyon Road Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501 505.983.2745 bc@bellasartesgallery.com