Global Courant 2023-04-21 18:30:06
Claudio Paul Caniggia welcomes visitors. As much as his face fades, the Argentine National Team shirt paints him body and soul. Further in the background, Lionel Messi in black and white appears sleeping with the World Cup in his hands as a crowd celebrates the title at the Obelisk. There are also Bochini, Bilardo, Valderrama and even the Brazilian Mario Zagallo. Portraits and more portraits. While some can be distinguished from a league away, the one from Mostaza Merlo appears faceless, although any soccer fan will be able to identify him by his long hair.
This is what Füssballwerk is about, the exhibition by Marcelo Barchi, a Buenos Aires artist residing in Córdoba, whose series of portraits of Diego’s multiple faces surprised at the MAPA fair, last March at La Rural. Some 120 paintings linked to the world of football – from its main protagonists to peripheral personalities of the most popular sport – are now on display until May 18 at Futbolitis (Thames 1876).
Portrait of Diego Maradona in Futbolitis.
The Palermo gallery was born in 2021 to host exhibitions with a well-defined curatorial thread. “A conceptual space where football and art are constantly related”, explains Ezequiel Suranyi, gallery owner of Futbolitis. The cut makes recognized artists of the contemporary field participate, in their football profile, both in samples and behind the scenes. The oil-painted t-shirts by Mariana López and the series La mano de Dios by Eduardo Longoni share space with works by foreign and local artists Patricio Larrambebere, Lucía Harari and Guillermo Iuso, among others. As in the case of Iuso, courtesy of the Ruth Benzacar gallery, on May 20 Carlos Herrera opens his own exhibition here.
In your head there is a goal
Curated by Diego Vigna, Füssballwerk –whose literal translation would be works on soccer; “There is no reason why it is in German, I liked how it sounded”, Suranyi conceded – he brings the works of Barchi to Buenos Aires for the first time, which expands on various techniques. Some drawings are made with Chinese ink on paper. There are also works of glazing, modeling of the image, and a lot of water in the inks.
“The glaze is quite common in my work. It is adding matter not so concentrated but more diluted. This is generating layers and also an essence within the painting”, explains Barchi, who has football and painting in his blood. “I don’t start painting from the image itself, from the face, but before it has a job of stains, somewhat informalist, and then I go into detail”, he comments.
In addition to soccer stars, Barchi portrayed peripheral characters such as soccer reporters.
Marcelo Barchi was born with the ball at his feet and with a brush in his hand. As a boy, he used to play with his brothers and friends on a little field in Córdoba. Although this Boca fan today only plays soccer with his friends from time to time, the love for art runs in the family. “My grandmother Gloria Fuentes was a painter; In her house was the workshop with the smell of oil, turpentine and turpentine. In Buenos Aires, she painted with Héctor Borla, a specialist in hyperrealism, and also with Estela Pereda,” says Barchi, who graduated from the Dr. Figueroa Alcorta Higher School of Fine Arts in 2010, at the University of Córdoba. He then did workshops with Marcos Acosta and clinics with Lucas Di Pascuale and Aníbal Buede.
Barchi does not always paint players, he also paints natural landscapes and other portraits: “The work is pictorial, the image is the excuse,” he clarifies.
Füssballwerk includes large, medium and small format paintings. The Diegos series stands out, a panel of 30 portraits of Maradona, from the days of Argentinos Juniors through Boca, Barcelona, Napoli, Newell’s until when he was a gymnastics coach. “I started the series in 2019, before his death, with a technique that ranges from modeling to sweeping and a bit to informalism and color experimentation,” he reveals. “Diego is to have many masks. He is very rich in terms of the image of him. He must be the most photographed man on the planet. The image of him is iconic,” he adds.
A specific Diego. Marcelo Barchi began the series shortly before the death of the idol.
Some of these portraits appear as if they were blurred, although the figure of Maradona is glimpsed. The same happens with other images that are in the sample, such as those of Caniggia, Mostaza Merlo or Valderrama. “Sometimes, the rapid exercise of being in the activity of painting, many times that speed of the exercise of painting makes it plastically leave it that way.”
There are more portraits of Maradona lifting the World Cup in Mexico ’86 and one with dark glasses, all in black and white when he was making the Emir Kusturica documentary. “Manu Chao sang to him If I were Maradona. I captured the moment when Diego comes down and sees him sing. I saw it emotional”, describes the artist.
In Füssballwerk there are oil paintings of characters closely linked to soccer and other peripherals such as Pedemonti, the one from Todo por dos peso, the mythical TV program hosted by Fabio Alberti and Diego Capusotto. There is also El Loco Gatti, Víctor Hugo Morales, Joseph Blatter, El Tula, Chilavert, Grondona, Menotti, Bobby Charlton, Castrilli, Coppola, Alejandro Dolina, Alberto Olmedo, Ever Ludeña, Pelé, Bianchi, Fontanarrosa, René Higuita, Falcioni, the “Coco” Basile, Jorge Porcel and the current president of the AFA, Chiqui Tapia.
The “bird” Claudio Paul Caniggia, recognizable.
In the background, stands out an immense portrait of George Best, one of the glories of Manchester United. Barchi was inspired by the famous phrase of the former Northern Irish footballer: “I have given up women and alcohol. It was the worst 20 minutes of my life.”
“They always have something that stands out because of their personality or the way they play or whatever they are. They are icons,” she comments.
There is also another painting of Diego in the Boca shirt greeting Ramón Díaz, in the last game Maradona played, in a Superclásico at the Monumental, in 1997. A cold greeting between two great idols when neither wanted to shake hands .
George Best, one of the glories of Manchester United.
Füssballwerk merges the two passions: football and art. “Football is a meeting with friends to have a good time. When the game starts the problems disappear. Running, deceiving the opponent, fighting… all this is part of how wonderful it is to play ball. You can do it well or badly but you have fun”, explains the artist. “But art is essential in my life; without art it would be empty”.
All the Diegos. Marcelo Barchi began portraying Maradona in 2019. Checho Batista, 1986 world champion, in his early days in Argentinos Jr. Various techniques are applied to the portraits.
Football work – Marcelo Barchi
Venue: Footballitis, Thames 1876
Hours: Monday to Saturday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Date: until May 18
Free entrance
