Sigfredo Chacón: Horror Vacui
at Mana Contemporary 8th fl. 2233 S Throop. Chicago IL 60608
Visiting hours: by appointment, please email us to schedule your visit: info@monirafoundation.org
Chacón’s Horror Vacui series (1994-2019), shown at Mana as a site-responsive installation along with related drawings, consists of a series of monochrome frames with empty centers, alternatingly hung and propped against the walls. Although the organizing principle is self-evident, to fully experience the work the viewer has to navigate it, experiencing each shift in color and space in turn. Horror Vacui is a reminder that as much as Chacón has come to embrace a conceptual approach to painting over the years, the Venezuelan legacy of phenomenological effects first found in kinetic environments is still implicit in his propositions.
About the artist:
Sigfredo was born in Caracas in 1950. He studied at the School of Fine and Applied Arts Cristóbal Rojas (1963-1966) and Design Institute Neumann-INCE, Caracas (1966-1970). He continued his training as a designer at the Chelsea School of Art and the London College of Printing, England. In the early seventies he participated in the Young confrontations Venezuelan News, Gallery Current Study Hall Arturo Michelena, Ateneo de Valencia, Valencia, and National Exhibition of Young Artists, House of Culture in Maracay, Aragua state. Together with Ibrahim Nebreda and William Stone did in 1971 an atmosphere denominada “The Bus” at the Ateneo de Caracas. And in the same room, a Disp UES year, he presented an exhibition called “Situations” by Eugenio Espinoza. His first solo itin expos, “Drawings and Painted recent tures”, took place in 1989 in Room llegos Ga Romulo Foundation CELARG. A continued was invited to the First Biennial of Visual Arts Christian Dior, the MACC (1989); and also collective “New pin abstract ture eight approaches” (traveling exhibition), 1990.
He won the Grand Prize in Painting Exhibition 50th Anniversary of the Banco Central de Venezuela, in 1990. He was included in the major retrospective ” 80 / Overview of the Visual Arts in Venezuela “(1991) and historical displays “Venezuela in the Pavilion of Arts” Universal Exposition in Seville, Spain, 1992, both organized by the GAN. Solo exhibition at the Art Museum Jacobo Borges, 1995.
