portrait by Hans Paul Brauns
Con su característico interés en la arquitectura barroca, edificios inventados, palacios fantásticos y avenidas caprichosas, Pedro Friedeberg - arquitecto de confusiones impecables - presenta nuevas series de pintura, escultura y gráfica inspirado por una intención de urbanismo surrealista. Fifípolis es un desarrollo imaginario para el siglo XXI al puro estilo del máximo Maestro Surrealista Mexicano.
With his characteristic interest in baroque architecture, invented buildings, fantastic palaces and capricious avenues, Pedro Friedeberg - architect of impeccable confusion - presents his new series of painting, sculpture and graphics inspired by an intention of surreal urbanism. Fifipolis is an imaginary development for the 21st century in the style of the most important surrealist Mexican painter alive.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Nace en Florencia, Italia, el 11 de enero de 1937, es naturalizado Mexicano desde los 7 años llega a México debido a que sus padres, judíos alemanes, buscan refugio en México en 1939 escapando de la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Desde pequeño, Pedro Friedeberg muestra un interés por la pintura, de hecho sus artistas favoritos eran Piranesi y Canaleto.
Más adelante, por algún tiempo estudia en Boston y en 1957 ingresa a la carrera de arquitectura en la Universidad Iberoamericana, donde conoce a Mathias Goeritz, artista mexicano de renombre. Al encontrar su vocación, Pedro Friedeberg deja la carrera de arquitectura e inicia la de artes plásticas en la misma universidad.
Desde su primera exposición individual, la obra del autor se caracterizó por un estilo propio muy definido. En 1961 se integra al grupo denominado “Los Hartos” liderado por Mathias Goeritz. Precisamente en esta época (1962), Pedro Friedeberg realiza uno de sus primeros Muebles Fantásticos; se trata de La Silla Mano: una mano derecha de proporciones ergonómicas que permite sentarse en su palma y los dedos funcionan como respaldo.
Friedeberg se opone al racional-funcionalismo, en el que la función se sobrepone a la forma; el arte de este autor de alto prestigio repudia la ausencia de ornamento y fantasía, por lo que su pintura, escultura y estampa están llenas de simbolismos metafísicos, religiosos, hindúes y aztecas.
Ha recibido diversas becas y premios como en la Bienal de Córdoba, Argentina; en la Trienal de Grabado de Buenos Aires, Argentina; en la Bienal de San Juan, Puerto Rico; así como en la XI Bienal de Gráfica de Tokio, Japón, que junto con su exposiciones individuales y colectivas, lo han hecho una figura destacada dentro del arte mexicano. Entre las exposiciones que ha realizado hay que subrayar “Los Hartos” Galería Antonio Souza (México, D.F.), “Pedro Friedeberg” Galerie Carroll (Munich, Alemania), “Confrontación 66” Palacio de Bellas Artes (México, D.F.), “Fantastic Furniture”, Museum of Contemporary Crafts (Nueva York, E.U.A.), “Pedro Friedeberg” Ex-Convento del Carmen (Guadalajara, Jalisco, México), “Pedro Friedeberg” Museo de Arte Moderno (México, D.F.), “Cien pintores mexicanos” Museo de Arte Contemporáneo MARCO (Monterrey, Nuevo León, México), “Autorretratos” Museo de Arte Moderno (México, D.F.), “Pedro Friedeberg” Palacio de Bellas Artes (México, D.F.), “Réquiem por una mosca” Museo de la Secretaría de Hacienda y Crédito Público (México D.F.) y "Extravagancias y Pendejadas" FIFTY24MX (México D.F).
Por ser un artista de alta calidad y características distintivas, diversos museos y colecciones conservan obras de Friedeberg: Musee du Louvre París, Museum of Modern Art Nueva York (MOMA), Museo Omar Rayo Colombia, Museo José Luis Cuevas México, Museo de Arte Moderno de México, Tel Aviv y París, Museo Cavalino Italia, así como la Casa de Las Américas La Habana.
Surrealist artist best known for his “hand-chair” sculpture and his architectural inspired drawing creating unusual compositions that expresses irony and surfeit. Friedeberg belongs to a group of 20th century eccentric and iconoclastic artists like Gunther Gerzso and Leonora Carrington who were irreverent, rejecting the social and political art, which was dominant at the time. Friedeberg has had a lifelong reputation for being eccentric, and states that art is dead because nothing new is being produced.
His works can be found in the permanent collections of MoMA NY, the Musée du Louvre in Paris, Museo de Arte Moderno, the José Luis Cuevas Museum, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, the Museum of Contemporary Art in New Orleans, the Library of Congress in Washington DC, the Rose Art Museum of Brandeis University in Boston, the National Research Library in Ottawa, the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, the National Museum of Modern Art in Baghdad, the Ponce Museum of Art in Puerto Rico, the Franklin Rawson Museum in Argentina, the Omar Rayo Museum in Colombia the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, DC., The Museum of Arts and Design in New York.
From his first exhibition, his work has had an easily identifiable style, although it is not easily classifiable. He often uses architectural drawing as his medium to create unusual compositions including designs for useless objects, often as a result of boredom.[1] He has studied and incorporated elements of various artistic and design trends from his lifetimes from Art Noveau to Op Art. Much of his work has an industrial quality, stemming from his training as an architect. However, there is a dream like quality as well, painting impossible palaces and other structures, with innumerable halls and rooms, secret passages and stairs which are often absurd. Irony and surfeit are generally expressed through the almost hallucinogenic repetition of elements and formal disorder, but it is the result of conscious thought.
Paintings, furniture and more are often characterized as being filled with ornamentation, with little or no white space, with lines, colors and symbols referencing ancient scriptures, Aztec Codices, Catholicism, Hinduism and the occult.[1][6] While his art has been criticized as adding ornament for its own sake or even distraction, he disagrees, saying that ornamentation is the oldest form of fine art, added to give objects an exceptional, even religious quality. He has called his extensive ornamentation, which includes elements from ancient texts, “Nintendo Churrigueresque”.
Friedeberg belongs to a group of 20th century surrealist artists, which in Mexico include Gunther Gerzso, Mathias Goeritz, Alice Rahon, Kati Horna, Leonora Carrington, Remedios Varo and Paul Antragne, who were grouped together under the name of Los Hartos. They were original, eccentric, irreverent and iconoclastic.