Pérez Art Museum Miami

Kosice developed these new ideas during the time when Colonel Juan Perón ruled Argentina during 1946-1955, and again in 1973-1974. Perón controlled the country by limiting free speech, taking over worker groups, shutting down those who disagreed with him, and punishing artists and writers who criticized him. 

Together with other Madí artists, Kosice made abstract, geometric art that sent strong social and political messages. By breaking away from traditional art rules, they showed their resistance to Perón’s strict control. They used see-through materials and movement in their art as symbols of freedom in a country where freedom was limited. 

In 1944, artists Carmelo Arden Quin, Gyula Kosice, Rhod Rothfuss, and Tomás Maldonado published a magazine called Arturo. Though they only made one issue, it changed Argentinian art by rejecting art that tried to copy real life. 

After Arturo, two important art groups formed: 

Arte Madí was started in 1946 by Arden Quin, Kosice, and Rothfuss. These artists worked in many different ways, made canvases with unusual shapes, and created three-dimensional works. They also published a magazine called Arte Madí Universal. The name “Madí” was playful and didn’t have a specific meaning, which showed how they believed in complete freedom in art making.

The Asociación Arte Concreto-Invención, led by Maldonado, drew in trained artists who believed in sharing ownership and creating a society without class differences. These artists were inspired by Mondrian’s simple style—using basic shapes, primary colors, and straight lines in grid patterns to show harmony and order. This group also published their own magazine. 

While these two groups had different beliefs, both created “concrete art”—abstract geometric art that used pure visual elements like lines, flat areas, and colors instead of trying to create illusions. These movements significantly influenced future generations of South American artists, especially those working in geometric and kinetic art during the 1950s and 1960s. 

Gyula Kosice’s Coordinate of a Volume or Diagonals is a plexiglass sculpture that measures almost three feet tall, just over two and a half feet wide, and eleven inches deep. It is a lightweight, transparent acrylic structure. 

The sculpture’s foundation is a half-sphere of crystal-clear acrylic. Two circular openings punctuate the upper and lower portions of this hemisphere, creating visual breathing points that interrupt the otherwise continuous surface. 

At the center, vibrant purple half discs descend in a tiered formation that suggests a spiral or DNA helix, appearing to float within the transparent architecture. Each half disc is suspended by two slender cylindrical acrylic supports that maintain their exact spatial relationship. Two of these purple half-discs hang beneath the main hemisphere, positioned as if they’ve penetrated an invisible boundary—suggesting motion and the breaking of dimensional constraints. 

Suspended from the ceiling by an almost invisible wire, the sculpture appears to hover effortlessly in space. This allows light to penetrate from all angles, transforming the piece as lighting conditions shift. Shadows and reflections become integral components of the artwork, extending its presence beyond its material boundaries. 

Gyula Kosice’s Luminescent Madí Structure No. 6 is a bright blue neon sculpture that measures just under two feet tall, by one foot wide, and five inches deep. It is in portrait orientation, meaning that its shortest side runs parallel to the ground. 

The artwork features precisely bent glass (or neon) tubes that emit an electric cobalt blue light, forming a complex geometric composition of bold, angular intersections. These neon elements are arranged in an abstract pattern of dynamic diagonals and sharp turns, resembling something like an ancient petroglyph or a maze structure. 

Set against a rectangular black frame, the vibrant blue neon creates a dramatic contrast that makes the illuminated lines appear to float in space. The sculpture transforms its surrounding with its blue glow, showcasing Kosice’s innovative use of light as both medium and subject—a hallmark of his artistic vision that integrates energy and spatial dynamics into the work itself. 

This captivating installation showcases Kosice’s signature acrylic teardrop-shaped sculptures—a recurring motif throughout his artistic career. The teardrops are arranged in an asymmetrical pattern across the exhibition wall. Six teardrops hang on the wall, while three hang from the ceiling near the wall, and two stand on pedestals–commanding individual attention. 

The gallery space is enveloped in deep black walls with subtle ambient lighting. Nine of the teardrops are crafted from clear acrylic, while two are made with transparent, crimson red acrylic. Six of the teardrops are embedded with miniature lights in a spectrum of colors—vibrant reds, deep blues, ethereal light blues, rich purples, and varying translucent shades of white—that illuminate from within. Some contain water that seems to come alive through concealed electric pumps and aerators, generating gentle movement within the liquid. 

Against the absolute blackness of the background, these glowing, kinetic water vessels create a dramatic visual counterpoint—like a constellation of liquid stars suspended in the void of space. 

The Hydrospatial City is an immersive installation featuring seven illuminated constellations and nineteen plexiglass sculpture models. Each sculpture represents a distinct Hydrospatial Habitat conceived by Kosice. These visionary models comprise an imaginary transparent metropolis by the artist, designed to hover one and a half kilometers (approximately one mile) above Earth, powered by hydrogen and oxygen extracted from cloud vapor. 

The walls of the gallery are a deep, saturated blue with ambient lighting that enhances the otherworldly atmosphere. The translucent acrylic structures hang suspended from the ceiling by nearly invisible wires, creating the illusion of floating in space. Reminiscent of clouds and bubbles, these fantastical architectural forms echo the optimistic futurism of the 1950s and the space-age aesthetic popular during the Atomic Age. Each sculpture is illuminated from within, emanating a soft, ethereal glow that transforms the surrounding environment 

As light filters through these translucent forms, it projects intricate patterns across the walls and floor, mapping out celestial-like constellations. These projected light formations create a secondary layer of abstract figures and geometric shapes that seem to dance around the room, reinforcing the cosmic theme of Kosice’s visionary urban concept. The overall effect transforms the gallery into an immersive microcosm of this futuristic, airborne civilization. 

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Gyula Kosice: Intergalactic

Exhibition

One hundred years after his birth, Gyula Kosice: Intergalactic celebrates the career of the Argentine artist Gyula Kosice (b. 1924, Košice, Czechoslovakia; d. 2016, Buenos Aires, Argentina), an experimental artist, sculptor, poet, and theorist.

Through Sunday, September 7, 2025