Claudio Mario Girola Iommi (1923,

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– October 1994,

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) was an Argentine-Chilean visual artist, poet, and professor, known for his

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sculptures Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...

, many of which are on display in

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and

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. He is considered one of the driving forces behind the revival of Latin American visual art in the latter half of the 20th century. He is also known for being a signatory of the '' Manifiesto de Cuatro Jóvenes'' ''(Manifesto of Four Young Artists'') in 1942 which protested the annual National Art Exhibition of Buenos Aires (''Salón Nacional de Buenos Aires'') competition and its effects on art education in Argentina, as well as Argentine art education as a whole.

Early life and education

Claudio Girola Iommi was born in 1923 in

Rosario, Argentina Rosario () is the largest city in the central Argentine province of Santa Fe. The city, located northwest of Buenos Aires on the west bank of the Paraná River, is the third-most populous city in the country after Buenos Aires and Cordoba. W ...

, to Santiago Girola and Maria Iommi. His parents were

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immigrants, his father from

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and his mother from

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. He had two younger siblings,

Enio Iommi Enio Francisco Girola Iommi (20 March 1926 – 13 May 2013) was an Argentine visual artist who was particularly well known for his work as a concrete Sculpture, sculptor. In 1946 he co-founded the avant-garde Concrete-Invention Art Movement, whic ...

(1926–2013), a prolific sculptor, and Nidia Girola Iommi (1929–?). His family relocated to

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shortly after his birth. His maternal uncle, (1917–2001), was a notable poet, architect, and educator. Girola began studying art with his brother Enio in their father's workshop, where they learned

sculpting Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...

from their father. He later studied drawing under Spanish-Argentine artist Eugenio Fornells. In 1939, he began attending the Manuel Belgrano National Fine Arts School and studied under Antonio Sibellino. He attended the National University of the Arts from 1940 to 1943, where he switched from studying drawing to studying sculpting.

Career

In 1942, Girola and fellow Buenos Aires art students Jorge Brito, Tomas Maldonado, and Alfredo Hlito wrote and signed a pamphlet entitled ''Manifiesto de Cuatro Jóvenes'' which protested the annual National Art Exhibition of Buenos Aires (''Salón Nacional de Buenos Aires'') competition hosted at

Palais de Glace The Palais de Glace () is a rumeno style Belle Époque building in the Recoleta, Buenos Aires, Recoleta neighbourhood of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Located at 1430 Posadas street, it was modelled on the Théâtre du Rond-Point, Palais des Glaces in ...

and its effects on art education. The document thrust the four young artists into a spotlight, which led to Girola, his brother Enio, Maldonado, and Hlito forming the Concrete Art-Invention Association (''Asociación Arte Concreto-Invención'', AACI) in 1945. The group had its first exhibition in 1946 and disbanded in 1947. Girola's first solo exhibition was in 1947 at the Kraft Hall in Buenos Aires. In 1949, he relocated to Europe where he would reside between Paris and Milan and studied sculpting under

Georges Vantongerloo Georges Vantongerloo (24 November 1886, Antwerp – 5 October 1965, Paris) was a Belgian sculptor, painter, designer of furniture and buildings, and founding member of the De Stijl group. Life From 1905 to 1909 Vantongerloo studied Fine Art at th ...

. He has his first solo exhibition in Europe that year, located at the Salto Bookstore Gallery in Milan. His work with Group MAC in Milan allowed him to gain exposure in

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. In 1951, Girola briefly returned to Buenos Aires where he joined the Group of Modern Argentine Artists (''Grupo de Artistas Modernos de la Argentina'', GAMA) and participated in an exhibition of theirs at the Viau Gallery in Buenos Aires. The following year, he was invited by the

Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaíso The Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaíso () (PUCV), also known as ''Universidad Católica de Valparaíso'' (UCV), is one of six Catholic universities in Chile and one of the two pontifical universities in the country, along with th ...

(PUCV) to exhibit at the

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Exhibition Hall in

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and the Miramar Hotel in

. Following this exhibition, he was invited in 1953 to become a professor of visual arts at the university, which he accepted and immigrated to Chile, settling in Viña del Mar. That year, he was featured in the International Exhibition of Abstract Sculpture at the

Stedelijk Museum The Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (; Municipal Museum Amsterdam), colloquially known as the Stedelijk, is a museum for modern art, contemporary art, and design located in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

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during a biennial celebration in the city. In 1956, he became a founding professor of the School of Architecture at PUCV. In 1962, Girola exhibited at the 31st

Venice Biennale The Venice Biennale ( ; ) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy. There are two main components of the festival, known as the Art Biennale () and the Venice Biennale of Architecture, Architecture Biennale (), ...

. The following year, he was featured in a

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art exhibition at the National Museum of Fine Arts in Buenos Aires, which won him the 1963 Braque Prize awarded by the French government. Around this time, he began his works in the field of

poetry Poetry (from the Greek language, Greek word ''poiesis'', "making") is a form of literature, literary art that uses aesthetics, aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language to evoke meaning (linguistics), meanings in addition to, or in ...

when he began in 1964 as a collaborator for the French poetry review journal ''Revue de Poésie.'' In 1965, Girola and his uncle Godofredo took part in the first Travesía de Amereida, an annual artistic expedition from

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which consisted of designers, sculptors, poets, painters, and architects from Latin America and Europe. He was a contributor to the 1967 multi-authored poem about the expedition, ''Amereida''. Following his return from this expedition, his works were featured in two high-profile exhibits at the Visual Arts Center of the Di Tella Institute: the Argentina in the World Exhibition in 1965, and the Beyond Geometry Exhibition in 1967. In the 1970s and 80s, Girola primarily exhibited at galleries in Buenos Aires and Santiago. He also exhibited at the 11th

biennale In the art world, a biennale ( , ; ), is a large-scale international contemporary art exhibition. The term was popularised by the Venice Biennale, which was first held in 1895, but the concept of such a large scale, and intentionally internationa ...

celebration at the Middelheim Open Air Sculpture Museum in

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in 1971. Starting in 1973, he became a professor of

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and

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at PUCV. In 1976, he became one of the founders of (''Open City''), an experimental architecture project founded by his uncle Godofredo and led by PUCV staff in the Ritoque locality of the Quintero commune which features several unique works of architecture. He designed the project's "El Pozo" space, an area designed to appeal to the

senses A sense is a biological system used by an organism for sensation, the process of gathering information about the surroundings through the detection of stimuli. Although, in some cultures, five human senses were traditionally identified as su ...

individually. In 1988, he designed seven statues in the park of the in

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. In 1990, Girola was featured in the international Art in Latin America exhibit that exhibited in

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, and

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. The next year, PUCV hosted an exhibition called Claudio Girola Sculpture and Journey 1940-1991 in the Providencia Sculpture Park of Santiago which was a retrospective of his works over the years. After a series of four exhibitions in Chile and Spain in 1992, he retired from sculpting until his death in 1994. As of 2025, Girola's sculptures and paintings can be found on display in collections throughout Argentina and Chile. In Buenos Aires, his works can be found in the collections of the Museum of Latin American Art, the National Museum of Fine Arts, and the Aldo de Souza Art Gallery. In Chile, his works can be found in the collections of PUCV's Exhibition Hall at its Valparaíso campus, the Amereida Cultural Corporation in Viña del Mar, and the Policentro Building and Museum of Contemporary Art in Santiago. He also has sculptures in the collection of the Faculty of Architecture at the

National University of Córdoba The National University of Córdoba (), is a public university located in the city of Córdoba, Argentina. Founded in 1613, the university is the oldest in Argentina, the third oldest university of the Americas, with the first university being ...

. There are sculptures of his on display in Santiago's Providencia Sculpture Park, and a sculpture in Valparaíso's La Matriz Square dedicated to Dionisio Faúndez, a young man who gained minor popularity in Valparaíso around 1966 for his profession as a

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Style

Girola primarily created abstract works of sculpture and painting within the

concrete art Concrete art was an art movement with a strong emphasis on geometrical abstraction. The term was first formulated by Theo van Doesburg and was then used by him in 1930 to define the difference between his vision of art and that of other abstract ar ...

style. He originally started creating sculptures in the traditional Argentine figurative style before transitioning to an abstract planar style with oblique, horizontal, or curved forms that broke traditional mass into spatial planes. Instead of traditional solid mass, his sculptures became constructs of planes (vertical, horizontal, or oblique) interacting in space to suggest movement and tension. A defining characteristic of his mature style is the integration, or elimination, of the

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, turning the support into an active component of the artwork itself. This challenged viewers’ expectations and created a spatial ambiguity, as the artwork no longer sat on something but often appeared suspended or dispersed. His later works often employed fragmentation, cut planes, and voids. He acknowledged his intention to “build a void” and to put

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in operation in his later works. This was part of a larger artistic and philosophical inquiry he pursued while working on the Ciudad Abierta. There, his works engaged not only with sculptural tradition but also with landscape, poetry, and architecture, blurring disciplines. Girola’s drawings and collages are crucial in understanding his thought process: they are not only studies but parallel fields of invention. His two-dimensional works often contain layered planes, rhythmic structures, and material experiments echoing his sculptural explorations.

Personal life

Girola married in 1982 to a Chilean woman named Maria Eliana del Corazón de Jesús Lira Calvo in Viña del Mar."Girola Iommi Claudio Mario" No. 27, Valparaíso Marriage Records 1985. ''Registro Civil de Chile, 1940-1995''. 1985. pp. 212 Claudio Girola Iommi died in Viña del Mar in October 1994. He was buried at {{ill, Cementerio de la Ciudad Abierta, lt=Cementerio de la Ciudad Abierta, es, Cementerio de la Ciudad Abierta at the Ciudad Abierta in Ritoque.

Works

Notable solo exhibitions

Source: * 1947: ''New Art Exhibition'', Kraft Hall, Buenos Aires * 1948: ''Concrete Art Exhibition'', Müller Gallery, Buenos Aires * 1949: Salto Bookstore Gallery, Milan * 1949: ''Concrete Art Exhibition 1949-1950'', Como * 1952: ''Argentine Concrete Artists'', Exhibition Hall, Ministry of Education, Santiago * 1952: ''Concrete Art'', Miramar Hotel, Viña del Mar * 1953: ''Argentine Sculpture'', Krayd Gallery, Buenos Aires * 1953: ''Concrete Art'',

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...

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* 1953: ''Ten Great Masters'', Paseo Defensa,

San Telmo San Telmo ("Saint Pedro González Telmo") is the oldest ''Barrios of Buenos Aires, barrio'' (neighborhood) of Buenos Aires, Argentina. A well-preserved area of the Argentine metropolis, it hosts some of its oldest buildings. One of the birthplace ...

* 1961: ''Claudio Girola, Sculptures'', Retrospective 1945-1960, National Museum of Fine Arts, Santiago * 1962: XXXI Venice Biennale, Venice * 1963: ''From Concrete Art to the New Argentine Tendency 1944-1963'', Museum of Modern Art, Buenos Aires * 1964: Pascal Gallery, Paris * 1965: ''Eight Sculptors'', La Ruche Gallery, Buenos Aires * 1965: ''Argentina in the World'', Visual Arts Center of the Di Tella Institute, Buenos Aires * 1967: ''Beyond Geometry'', Visual Arts Center of the Di Tella Institute, Buenos Aires * 1968: ''International Exhibition of Abstract Sculpture'', Amsterdam Biennial, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam * 1968: ''Drawings by Claudio Girola'', Exhibition Hall of the School of Architecture of the Pontifical Catholic University of Valparaíso, Valparaíso * 1970: ''Abstract Sculpture'', Hebrew Society of Argentina, Buenos Aires * 1970: ''Claudio Girola, Sculptures'', Rubbers Gallery, Buenos Aires * 1971: ''Claudio Girola, Sculptures'', Central Art Gallery, Santiago * 1971: XI Biënale Middelheim Antwerpen, Antwerp * 1971: ''Fifty Years of Argentine Sculpture'', National Museum of Fine Arts, Buenos Aires * 1971: ''The Family'', Carmen Waugh Gallery, Santiago * 1974: ''Claudio Girola, Sculptures, Temperas and Inks'', Carmen Waugh Gallery, Buenos Aires * 1976: ''Avant-garde of the 1940s'', Eduardo Sivori Museum of Plastic Arts, Buenos Aires * 1977: ''Eleven Spaces'', Ruth Bencazar Gallery, Buenos Aires * 1978: ''Braque Prize Retrospective 1963-1969'', Eduardo Sivori Museum of Plastic Arts, Buenos Aires * 1985: ''Eleven Artists from Valparaíso'', National Museum of Fine Arts, Santiago * 1985: ''Contemporary Chilean Sculpture'', Art Gallery of the

University of Concepción Universidad de Concepción (UdeC) is a traditional Chilean private university. The work of the Penquista community, it is one of the most prestigious in Chile, and considered complex due to its extensive research in the various areas of knowled ...

, Concepción * 1985: ''Abstraction in the 20th Century'', Museum of Modern Art, Buenos Aires * 1987: ''Argentine Sculpture, the Last 15 Years'', Center for Modern Art, Buenos Aires * 1987: ''Dispersa II'', Carmen Waugh Gallery, Santiago * 1990: ''Art in Latin America'', London, Stockholm, Madrid * 1991: ''Claudio Girola Sculpture and Journey 1940-1991'', Providencia Sculpture Park, Santiago * 1992: Chilean Pavilion at the Universal Exposition,

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* 1992: ''Sculptural Presence'', Providencia Sculpture Park, Santiago * 1992: ''Thirty Years of Sculpture'', Praxis Gallery, Santiago * 1992: ''Academic Artists of the Universities of Valparaíso'', El Farol Hall, Valparaíso

Group exhibitions

Source: * 1946: ''Concrete Art-Invention Association Exhibition'', Peuser Hall, Buenos Aires (with AACI) * 1947: ''Concrete Art-Invention Association Exhibition'', Van Riel Gallery, Buenos Aires (with AACI) * 1952: ''Modern Artists of Argentina'', Viau Gallery, Buenos Aires (with GAMA) * 1953: ''Group of Modern Artists'', Krayd Gallery, Buenos Aires (with GAMA) * 1953: Museum of Modern Art, Rio de Janeiro (with GAMA) * 1955: Viau Gallery, Buenos Aires (with GAMA) * 1963: ''Carlos Pacheco and Claudio Girola'', Nice Gallery, Buenos Aires (with

Carlos Pacheco Carlos Pacheco Perujo (14 November 1961 – 9 November 2022) was a Spanish comics penciller. After breaking into the European market doing cover work for Planeta De Agostini, he gained recognition doing work for Marvel UK, the England-based bra ...

) * 1963: ''Sculptures by Claudio Girola and Ennio Iommi'', National Museum of Fine Arts, Buenos Aires (with Enio Iommi) * 1981: ''Francisco Méndez-Claudio Girola'', Sala de Arte Viña del Mar, Viña del Mar (with Francisco Méndez Labbé)

Posthumous exhibitions

Source: * 1995: ''50 Years of the Concrete Art-Invention Association'', Cultural Center of Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires * 1999: ''A Creative Horizon by Claudio Girola'', El Farol Hall, Valparaíso * 2001: ''Claudio Girola, Sculptor'', National Museum of Fine Arts, Santiago * 2007: ''Art and Natural Resources: Mining'', Museum of Contemporary Art,

University of Chile The University of Chile () is a public university, public research university in Santiago, Chile. It was founded on November 19, 1842, and inaugurated on September 17, 1843.

, Santiago * 2007: ''Claudio Girola: Invention and Journey 1923-1994'', Telefónica Foundation, Santiago

References

1923 births 1994 deaths Argentine sculptors Chilean sculptors Argentine painters Chilean painters Argentine art educators Chilean art educators Concrete art People from Buenos Aires