The radical sculpture of Elena Asins 'returns' to the Picasso Museum in Malaga half a century later

There is something off with the title of this information. The Picasso Museum Málaga (MPM) has just celebrated its 22nd anniversary, so mathematically, it's impossible for Elena Asins (Madrid, 1940-Azpíroz, Navarra, 2015) to return to the art gallery 55 years later. But there is an explanation. Indeed, the sculptor exhibited at the Buenavista Palace on San Agustín Street over a century ago, but at that time, the art gallery occupying this space was the Museum of Fine Arts. There, Asins displayed her scenic and conceptual arsenal by bringing "with all her prestige the solution—the geometric and plastic solutions," as reported by SUR in 1971. The same can be said about this debut/return of the National Prize for Plastic Arts (2011) winner to Picasso with 'Antigone,' one of the great works from her last creative phase in which she draws on Greek tradition to show her rebellion and critique of power.

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"I am convinced that Elena would have liked to inhabit the Picasso Museum," said the director of the MPM and curator of the exhibition, Miguel López-Remiro, this Thursday. During the presentation of 'Elena Asins. Antigone,' he explained that he knew the artist and the creation of this monumental sculpture, which occupies the temporary exhibition hall on the ground floor alone, next to the audiovisual 'Hemón,' which complements this look at the author's final thoughts. A radical work inspired by classical that stars in the 'Guest Work' program of Picasso and with which Asins returned to her origins. If she then worked with poetry as raw material and intellect, the artist of algorithms and calculation for the realization of her works revisited the word to turn the letters of the Greek alphabet into sculpture with the name of the classical heroine to claim her figure and her resistance to power.

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This monumental typography made of corten steel and painted black reaches all its scenic splendor forming a crooked line in the room of the Picasso Museum, where the work is displayed diagonally to achieve its "maximum dimension," also allowing the visitor and spectator to move around this classic myth of Antigone which, for the curator and director, is an "alter ego" of Elena Asins herself due to her rebellion against power. "She wanted to make that word a sculpture that, at the end of her life, connected with her trajectory and her beginnings by recovering the letter as a sculptural space," explained López-Ramiro about this fundamental work that "reads like a book" and has been loaned by the Reina Sofía Museum in Madrid, the universal heir of the conceptual artist's work.

Málaga recovers Elena Asins with an exhibition that connects with the Palmo Collective and the local contemporary art of the seventies

"Being able to have Elena's work here in Málaga also allows us to link it with the exhibitions she did in the seventies at the Ateneo de Málaga, the College of Architects, and particularly the Buenavista Palace when it was the Museum of Málaga over half a century ago," noted Miguel López-Remiro, who also highlighted Asins' connection with Málaga's contemporary art at that time: "She found something in the Palmo Collective and in the avant-garde that inspired her."

In addition, the monumental piece joins the video 'Hemón' -Antigone's partner in this Greek tragedy-, specifically version 89 of this audiovisual of over eight hours that features music synthesized by the sculptor and fundamental artist of our time. "When I visited her in May 2015 -a few months before her death-, she gave me this version on a USB drive and it is the one shown here," revealed the curator, who did not hesitate to remember the winner of the Gold Medal of Merit in Fine Arts and the National Prize for Plastic Arts as "a radical figure of our art" who, like Picasso, was a "great mentor in transmitting her talent to other generations".

"Pain" for the victims of Adamuz

This exhibition was scheduled for last Thursday, but the national mourning for the railway accident in Adamuz delayed this week's final presentation. Alongside the museum director and delegate of Culture of the Junta de Andalucía, Carlos García, Bernard Ruiz-Picasso, patron, collector and president of the Executive Council of the MPM, remembered the victims and their families, to whom he expressed his "pain" and solidarity. Pablo Picasso's grandson recalled the values of culture to explore the human being as a vehicle for repair and knowledge. "The work of Elena Asins also demonstrates this with its dialogue with the current collection and the exhibition 'Memory and Desire,'" highlighted the museum trustee who remembered the great connection of the art gallery with the Reina Sofía.

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The presentation also included Carlos Urroz, director of the Institutional Cabinet of the Madrid museum, who noted that his institution shares with the MPM "the figure of Picasso" -it exhibits the monumental 'Guernica'- because it is not only an attraction for visitors, "but it allows us to undertake other research projects that speak of modernity and rupture." The official explained that his exhibition center makes more than a thousand loans of its works each year and highlighted the special connection with Elena Asins, who declared the Reina Sofia the universal heir of all her legacy.

"It is quite unusual for a museum, so ten years ago we not only found ourselves with a great collection of other works but also with two cars, a house, and a small account," revealed Urroz, who added that, after selling the vehicles, they are now trying to convert Elena Asins' rural house in Aspiroz into "an artist's residency" in Navarra. Regarding the sculptor's artistic legacy, he assured that 'Antigone' is a work "very dear" for its uniqueness and for having been exhibited in the Nouvel building of the Reina Sofía and in the Senate. Looking at it, we see that "the word is as important as the shape of the word," Urroz concluded.