Komm, wir spielen Mensch
The Kunsthaus Zürich is presenting a retrospective of Venezuelan-American artist Marisol (1930–2016), whose playful yet formally sophisticated sculptures blend abstraction, figuration, and everyday objects. The exhibition traces her career from early shows at Leo Castelli's gallery through her participation in the 1961 and 1963 Museum of Modern Art group exhibitions, her 1968 'European year' representing Venezuela at the Venice Biennale and featuring on the 4th documenta, to her subsequent decades-long disappearance from the European art scene.
The retrospective matters because it reintroduces a long-overlooked female artist whose work bridges Pop Art and Nouveau Réalisme while addressing themes of gender roles, social inequality, and ecology. Marisol's personal history—including her mother's suicide when she was 11—infuses her art with deeper layers beneath its initial joyful appearance, making this exhibition a significant reclamation of a once-prominent but forgotten figure in 20th-century art history.