Marisa Merz: Marisa Merz: The Sky is a Great Space / Álvaro Lapa: Álvaro Lapa: All of Time

Marisa Merz: The Sky is a Great Space

A major retrospective of Italian painter, sculptor and installation artist Marisa Merz (Turin, 1926), the exhibition brings together five decades of the artist’s pioneering work and includes Merz’s early Arte Povera experiments with non-traditional materials and processes, the enigmatic heads and faces she created in the 1980s and 1990s, and her installations that balance intimacy with impressive scale. The exhibition also features the artist’s painting and graphic work, combining collage elements and diverse materials including tape, mirrors, binder clips, bottle caps, and metallic pigments, such as a recent group of large paintings of winged angels, which contrast a striking beauty with a surprising absence of sentimentality.

Organized by the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in close collaboration with Fondazione Merz, Turin, in Europe the exhibition is co-organized by the Serralves Foundation – Museum of Contemporary Art, Porto, and Museum der Moderne, Salzburg. ‘Marisa Merz: The Sky is a Great Space’ is curated by Connie Butler, Chief Curator, Hammer Museum, and Ian Alteveer, Curator, Department of Modern and Contemporary Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Álvaro Lapa: All of Time

Álvaro Lapa (Évora, 1939–Porto, 2006) remains among the most influential yet enigmatic artists in 20th century Portuguese art. Lapa bridged disparate traditions of painting through a sustained exploration of the relationship between image and text, canvas and page, painting and literature. The exhibition, the most comprehensive retrospective to date, features over 300 works in painting, drawing and sculpture from throughout the artist’s career brought together for the first time, surveying Lapa’s remarkable contribution to contemporary art.

Álvaro Lapa: All of Time is organized by the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art, Porto, and is curated by guest curator Miguel von Hafe Pérez, assisted by Isabel Braga, Serralves curator.

The exhibition is accompanied by a cycle of performing arts, cinema and talks that considers the influence of Álvaro Lapa on artists working in the fields of theatre, performance and the visual arts, including the premiere of works by Jorge Silva Melo / Artistas Unidos, Von Calhau! and Isabel Carvalho.

Adam Linder: Service No. 5

Adam Linder (Sydney, Australia, 1983), one of the most innovative young choreographers working today, has been making work within the format of Choreographic Services for the last five years.

In Service No.5 Linder works with four performers, constructing graphic tableaux or fictional physical architectures that latch onto the walls and floors of museum and art galleries, responding to Álvaro Siza’s unique architecture for the Serralves Museum.

Éliane Radigue: Naldjorlak

Éliane Radigue (Paris, 1932) is one of the most notable and influential composers working today, alongside names like Terry Riley and Steve Reich. In the 2000s she began to work on compositions dedicated to acoustic instruments, usually organized in cycles. Naldjorlak, the first of these cycles, was initially inspired by a recital by American cellist Charles Curtis and is presented at Serralves by Curtis and musicians Carol Robinson and Bruno Martinez.

For further information and image requests, please contact Marta Morais: m.morais [​at​] serralves.pt.  

About Serralves
The Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art is the foremost museum for contemporary art in Portugal, and one of Europe’s most renowned institutions for contemporary art and culture. Uniquely sited on the grounds of the Serralves Foundation, which also comprises a park and the Serralves Villa, a landmark Art Deco building, the museum designed by Álvaro Siza opened in 1999. Through its exhibitions, collection, publications, performing arts, and public programmes, the museum fosters the understanding and appreciation of contemporary art and culture in Portugal and around the world.