After arriving in Argentina in 1939, Ester Pilone developed a personal style within Abstract Expressionism characterised by informalist tendencies. Her work aimed at achieving non-figurative dense materiality and chromatic sobriety. Pilone’s painting Luz amarilla (1970) is a clear example of the unique combination of techniques practised by the artist in her work, from which she managed to create abstract scenarios in which different kinds of emotional temperaments coexisted. In this piece, we can see how the monochromatic purity of the yellow colour creates a luminous spatiality. Within this space, Pilone inserts a mysterious abstract form whose trembling edges create a formal contrast, amalgamating the diverse vocabulary of non-figurative painting. In Luz amarilla, the symbolic ambivalence resulting from these contrasting attitudes is further accentuated by the uneasy coexistence of opposing modern techniques. This included the cohabitation of ascetic geometric precision and the heart-breaking expression of kinetic brushstrokes created using loaded spatulas, which she usually spread with her hands – a characteristic approach to painting that defines the expressive power of her abstraction.
This is the first time the work of Ester Pilone is presented at Biennale Arte.
—Nicolas Cuello
