Gregorio Vardánega

Gregorio Vardanega (Passagno, Italy, 1923 - Paris, France, 2007), he settled in Argentina when he was very young. In 1939 he began his artistic training at the National Academy of Fine Arts, graduating in 1946 as a professor of drawing.
In 1946 he joined the Asociación Arte Concreto-Invención, participating in several of its exhibitions. Two years later he travels to Europe in the company of Carmelo Arden Quin and, in 1949, he exhibits at the Salon de Amérique Latine in Paris, where he came into contact with important abstract artists.
In 1950 he returns to Argentina and presents his works in the exhibition Joven pintura, organized by the Peuser Gallery. In his first works he uses glass and plexiglass, and from flat geometric forms he moves on to research on the hemisphere. Later, his interest in kinetic research led him to devise mobile mechanisms and, by the 1960s, the Plexiglas spheres had the peculiarity of containing other smaller spheres or of receiving projections of colored lights. From few and simple elements, Vardanega manages to create multiple variations with plays of light and movement.
He is one of the founding members of the Asociación Arte Nuevo and the group Artistas no Figurativos Argentinos (ANFA).