Harper\'s Bazaar UK - 10.2019

October 2019 | HARPER’S BAZAAR | 17 9

The gallerist Pilar Ordovás has delved into

Mayfair’s 1930s art scene to pay tribute to

the pioneering 20th-century collector

Peggy Guggenheim, who spent a brief but

formative period operating a small space on

Cork Street. Open from January 1938 to

June 1939, Guggenheim Jeune was designed

as a platform for foreign artists establish-

ing their names in Britain, such as Wassily

Kandinsky, Yves Tanguy and Jean Arp.

‘While Peggy was in London, she realised

she wanted to be a gallery owner, not an art

dealer,’ says Ordovás. ‘She planned to open

MAYFAIR MODER NISM

Pilar Ordovás’ homage to Peggy Guggenheim’s radical gallery

‘A colour is never seen as it really is – as it physically

is. This fact makes colour the most relative medium in

art,’ wrote Josef Albers in a seminal 1963 book that

provides the inspiration and title for a new exhibition

at the Cristea Roberts Gallery, ‘The Interaction of

Colour’. Tracing Albers’ influence on a generation

of artists, the show juxtaposes Bridget Riley’s vivid,

mind-bending works with Rana Begum’s lively

geometric interactions and Polly Apfelbaum’s

dazzling rainbow stripes. MH

‘ T h e I n t e r a c t i o n o f C o l o u r ’ r u n s f r o m 1 3 S e p t e m b e r t o 2 6 O c t o b e r

at the Cristea Roberts Gallery (www.cristearoberts.com).

ART

CHROMATIC

CREATIONS

A forthcoming show revels in

the power of colour

her own museum of modern art, and if the

war hadn’t got in the way, it could have been

in London instead of Venice, where it is

today.’ To commemorate that bold ambi-

tion, Ordovás will present a selection of

Arp’s sculptures and Tanguy’s paintings,

many originally shown at Jeune, charting

the start of Guggenheim’s lifelong quest

to assemble an internationally renowned

collection of abstract and Surrealist art. FH

‘Peggy Guggenheim and London’ is at Pilar

Ordovás (www.ordovasart.com) from 24

September to 14 December.

Clockwise from above: ‘Hudson Valley

River Nirvana 5’ (2016) by Polly

Apfelbaum. A detail from Rana

Begum’s ‘No. 861’ (2018). ‘Large

Fragment’ (2006) by Bridget Riley

Above: Pilar
Ordovás.
Right: Peggy
Guggenheim

EXHIBITIONS