MARINA APOLLONIO

Spazio Ad Attivazione Cinetica 6B, 1966-2015

Vinyl (original work: Steel, wood, PVC)

200 × 278 in
508 × 706.1 cm
El Museo del Barrio

Italian artist, Marina Apollonio, was born in Trieste in 1940. One of the pioneers of ‘optical art’, or as it is now commonly known ‘op-art’ Apollonio, experimented with using industrial materials producing what appeared to be very depersonalised images and structures often based on the properties of the materials and mathematical, geometrically based systems.

The Guggenheim says of Apollonio’s work:

“After choosing a primary shape, for instance a circle, the artist would study its structural possibilities so that she could make it active, all the while striving to garner the maximum result via minimal means. This process was not at all tainted by subjectivity.”

Since the 1980s Marina Apollonio has dedicated herself to writing and research rather than making new visual works. She currently lives in Padua.

Paul Conneally
May 2016

Paul Conneally