MADRID.- Museo Reina Sofía is commemorating the 50th anniversary of Pablo Picasso's death: 'Picasso 1906. The Turning Point', on view starting today. Call It Something Else. Something Else Press, Inc. (1963-1974) will bring together the most complete archive on the activity of the American avant-garde publishing house and will be on view from September 27. On October 4, a retrospective of the artist Ben Shahn, one of the leading figures of American social realism, will arrive at the Reina Sofia. Finally, the anthological exhibition of Basque artist Ibon Aranberri will be on display from November 29.

'Picasso 1906. The Turning Point': As part of the commemorative events of the 50th anniversary of the death of Pablo Picasso (Malaga, 1881 - Mougins, 1973), Museo Reina Sofía is dedicating this exhibition to the work that the artist produced in 1906, a year in which he underwent his great transformation. The exhibition, curated by Eugenio Carmona, will be on view starting November 15 and is part of the activities planned by the National Commission for the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of Pablo Picasso's death, whose objective is to promote, from the perspective of our current reality, the relevance of one of the most transcendental and universal Spanish artists of the 20th century.

Picasso 1906. The Turning Point, made in collaboration with Musée Picasso Paris, is an exhibition that aims to look, from a contemporary aesthetic lens, at the artist's first contributions to the definition of "modern art". Until now, Picasso's production in 1906 has been understood as an epilogue to the pink period or as a prologue to Les Demoiselles d'Avignon. But today it can be affirmed that 1906 was a "period" with its own entity in Picasso's creative development.

The exhibition will be accompanied by a series of lectures to be held between November 2023 and March 2024, with the aim of reviewing Picasso's origins from a contemporary perspective. The program brings together leading specialists in the figure of Pablo Picasso such as María Dolores Jiménez-Blanco, Eugenio Carmona, Cécile Debray, Patricia Leighten, Estrella de Diego, Tamar Garb, Jèssica Jaques Pi and Robert Lubar.

Other exhibitions also on view:

Ibon Aranberri (29/11/2023 - 11/03/2024)

The anthological exhibition of Ibon Aranberri (Gipuzkoa 1967) brings together a selection of projects that have marked the career of the Basque artist from the 1990s to the present. Starting on November 29, the show will include little-known early works, emblematic projects in which Aranberri explores the effect of human action and political action on natural spaces: Luz sobre Lemoniz, 2000; Política hidráulica, 2004-2010; Obstáculos para la renovación, 2010-2022, etc., as well as pieces related to more recent works that revolve around learning the technical and manual professions of industry (Fuentes sin cualidades, 2016; Operatori, 2021), among others.

Call It Something Else. Something Else Press, Inc. (1963-1974)

This exhibition, on view since September 27, focuses on the avant-garde publishing house Something Else Press. Founded in 1963 in New York by artist and publisher Dick Higgins, and active until 1973, the publishing house set out to present creative projects, bringing unconventional content to a wide audience. The exhibition brings together the most complete archive of the publishing house's activities: books, newsletters, pamphlets, promotional objects, ephemeral material, music and videos aimed at disseminating concepts, ideas and creative experiments by composers, dancers, writers and artists. It will feature works by artists from different generations and backgrounds such as Higgins himself, Gertrude Stein, John Cage, Robert Filliou, George Brecht or Tomas Schmit.

Ben Shahn. On Nonconformity (04/10/2023 - 26/02/2024)

Since October 4, this retrospective by Ben Shahn (1898-1969), Lithuanian-born American painter, illustrator, graphic artist, photographer and writer reviews the career of the artist, one of the leading figures of American social realism born of the Great Depression and the poverty generated by the crisis of 1929. His political commitment led Shahn to depict historical events such as the execution of the Italian-American immigrants Sacco and Vanzetti, or to design posters for the trade union federation Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO-PAC) in favor of various demands. In the 1950s he achieved enormous popularity, even representing the United States at the 1954 Venice Biennale.

Museo Reina Sofía
'Picasso 1906. The Turning Point'
November 15th, 2023 - March 4th, 2024