#arts

Danish-Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson landed at the Guggenheim, in collaboration with Iberdrola, with a multimedia proposal that encouraged the viewer to reflect on their understanding and perception of the physical world around us.

Yayoi Kusama (1929–2026) lived in a psychiatric institution from the 1970s until her death. But none of this prevented her from creating. From a young age, she suffered from hallucinations and panic attacks, which she learnt to channel into creativity through obsession and repetition. She carved out a career spanning painting, sculpture, performance art and installations; she is regarded as a pioneer of the counterculture and one of the world’s most sought-after artists. Her extravagant vision came to the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao in 2023 through the exhibition ‘Yayoi Kusama: from 1945 to the present day’, sponsored by Iberdrola. In this interview, Lucía Agirre, the exhibition’s curator, helps us rediscover one of Japan’s most prestigious contemporary artists.

The car, with its links to design, art, cities, technology and the future, is the protagonist of the exhibition 'Motion. Autos, Art, Architecture', inaugurated in April 2022 at the Guggenheim Museum of Bilbao in collaboration with Iberdrola. Its curator, the architect Norman Foster, one of the most renowned on the international scene, is a self-confessed lover of automobiles: he collects them, admires them, drives them and now exhibits them. As a result of this passion, the cars are presented in the exhibition as aesthetic works on wheels accompanied by related works of art, which in turn reflect on the past and the future.

A history professor specialising in art, Javier González de Durana has curated the exhibition Jorge Oteiza and Eduardo Chillida. Dialogue of the 50s and 60s, which arrives at the San Telmo Museum in San Telmo, San Sebastian, on 8 April after its visit to Valencia. The exhibition, which includes works on loan from Iberdrola, presents for the first time the creations of two of the most internationally renowned Spanish sculptors of the 20th century. The most relevant thing for Durana is that the exhibition is not about the personal confrontation between the two artists, but about the years of friendship, encounter and mutual learning. An opportunity for healing art.

Alice Neel (1900-1984) had the ability to look, to look around her with empathy and immortalise it on canvas. Steeped in humanity, her works portray the most disadvantaged sectors of society: women, immigrants and the jobless. Her unique point of view is now on display at the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao and Lucia Agirre, curator of the exhibition Alice Neel: People come first, is an encounter with a great artist largely unknown to the general public.

Chillida Leku is hosting the exhibition Tàpies in Zabalaga, sponsored by the Iberdrola Foundation, until 10th January. An exhibition in which the work of the Catalan artist engages in a dialogue with that of Chillida, with whom, in addition to being good friends, he was united by the desire to transcend matter as a path towards spirituality and a humanist approach with which he underlined the transforming capacity of art. Mireia Massagué, director of Chillida Leku, invites us to enjoy the bond between two unique and inimitable artists at the Zabalaga farmhouse.