Marcos Acosta, from painting the rivers of Traslasierra to seeking inspiration in the landscapes of Colorado

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The Córdoba painter Marcos Acosta reset his career in an unexpected way, betting on one of the twists of fate that opened his talent, reflected in his work.

Since the beginning of 2024, he moved with his family to Denver, Colorado (United States), to begin a new stage as a visual artist.

The move, in his words, has him reliving the adrenaline of when he was 19 years old and was starting to move into the art world. “But with a great advantage: that now I have all the experience gained over several years,” says the artist from Córdoba (43).

But how does an artist from Córdoba get to the core (even in the very genesis of his work, enormously inspired by the rivers and landscapes of our mountains) to make his way into the North American market?

Marcos Acosta, in his studio (Courtesy Rocío Machado).

The story goes back nine years, when he received an email from Agustina Mistretta, who at that time was finishing studying careers related to art and curatorship in Buenos Aires.

She invited him to join a non-profit project she was promoting at the time, called Ether Art Projects, in which she brought together artists from different parts of the world whose work was linked to nature.

“When she wrote to me, I was going through a rather special moment in which I had really gotten very tired of working with galleries in general in Argentina, and I was working alone. When I saw that she was not linked to galleries or anything, and that the project was very interesting, I automatically said yes. And from there we were in contact, but always virtually.”

Mistreta soon settled in Aspen, something that surprised Acosta, since he would never have imagined that it could be an interesting destination for people who were interested in issues related to art.

“What about us VI”, de Marcos Acosta.

In 2019 she wrote to him telling him that she was going to participate with her project at the Aspen Art Fair, and that she would like to exhibit Marcos’ work, to which the man from Córdoba gladly agreed.

The pandemic put a damper on that first attempt, although the fair was held virtually.

There he had his first success. “Bob Chase, who is the owner of Hexton Gallery, saw my work and really liked it. He asked her about my work, and she began to triangulate a dialogue between the three of us.”

“Sanctuary”, by Marcos Acosta.

Find the right people

The initiative and the specific invitation for him to send a group of works came from Bob. “Bob is a guy with a very long career, spanning many years, he comes from a family of gallery owners: his father was a gallery owner, among others, of Salvador Dalí. Since he was a child, he has had direct contact with the most important art world we can imagine, with many connections. For me it was a real honor that someone like him, with his vision, saw my work and really liked it.”

The truth is that in two days he sold most of the works that Acosta had sent. “There we started collaborating together, as they call it. For me it is a dream come true: to be able to produce my work, and at the same time feel that the gallery is also doing everything so that the work comes to light, moves, and is sold.”

Second step, move

From this situation, Chase also decides together with Agustina to open a physical headquarters of the gallery in Aspen. “Suddenly I was working with a gallery in the United States whose director was Agustina Mistretta, so for me it was like perfect.”

They began the gallery cycle in Aspen with four scheduled shows, one of which was by Marcos, titled Memory of the World.

“I worked a lot on that exhibition and produced all new works. I put a lot of effort into getting them here. I didn’t even have a tourist visa to come and see the inauguration at that time, but nevertheless they did it, they inaugurated it, and it was a success. Almost all the works were sold and from there we didn’t stop. Everything has been a dizzying and exciting journey of each day going a little further and feeling that there is no ceiling, feeling that everything is yet to be done.”

After that event, Acosta was invited to settle with his wife and children in Colorado, something that finally took place in January 2024.

Work Lake in the sky, by Marcos Acosta.

–Your work is crossed by nature. How are you reacting to the stimuli that the landscape offers you there?

–Many things happen. Being here it’s like a very strange phenomenon occurs within me, which is that when someone asks me where I’m from, before I can say that I’m Argentine, I can say that I’m from Córdoba. I feel more identified with Córdoba than with Argentina in general. And in that sense, the landscape in Córdoba is clearly an indisputable presence, it is something that constitutes us: the mountains, the mountains, the river. But I discovered with this huge movement that the world is one, that the planet is one and that in reality we invent the limits in our heads and we build them that way, but they do not exist.

Marcos remembers that on his first trip to Aspen he had the opportunity to be in a river where he encountered the same shapes that inspired his paintings here. “He was very crazy, because he had the same type of stone, granite like that of Córdoba and shapes similar to the rivers that I have always painted, like Traslasierra. Strange shapes made by water erosion. The only thing that changed was that there were pine trees around it and suddenly the water was not the typical yellowish iodine color of the mountains of Córdoba, but was more blue. That experience connected me with a new type of landscape, although at the same time I began to feel that it doesn’t really matter where you are, because the landscape is within you. One is the landscape.”

This plastic artist who once knew how to establish a strong creative and friendship bond with Gustavo Cerati (a fan of his work) assures that the beautiful thing about the state of Colorado is that it seems to live inside a catalog of landscapes.

“You go from being in a forest to taking a turn on the road and falling into an incredible desert like the ones I love so much in northwest Argentina. A little further on you find a lake and it seems like you are in Patagonia. Nearby, about an hour from my house, there is a place that I discovered called Paint Mines, which in the middle of some meadows suddenly there is like a giant hollow where there is a whole kind of valley of the moon. An amazing Martian landscape.”

The works of Marcos Acosta at the Chicago Expo.

Playing in the big leagues

The first important event that Acosta had was the recent edition of the Chicago Expo, which he took as a litmus test. It was a success that surpassed him: he sold 13 works, in the context of a fair of enormous dimensions and figures of global relevance.

“Suddenly I found that in another stand there were works by David Hockney, who for me is like a hero, or by Lucian Freud, who had a work valued at four million dollars, for example, a small drawing.”

What also touched him was the very strong response from the public. “It was an energizing experience, which I compare to what a musician perhaps feels when he plays in front of a stadium full of people. That energy is very difficult for the painter to obtain because one is always separated from people.”

Marcos Acosta with Evan Hecox at ExpoChicago.

“Everyone read the same thing in what they saw, that underground thing that I work on in my work and that has to do with the spiritual, not so much with the art itself.”

From Costa Rica to New York

Weeks ago, Acosta went to Costa Rica, invited by the Biennial of the Americas organization, which is responsible for generating links, contacts, and strategies between Denver and cities throughout America.

The director of this organization, Flora Jane Di Rienzo, was able to learn about his work through his gallerist and was very impressed. “When he found out that I was coming to live here in Denver, he decided to join the delegation as a guest delegate, accompanying, among others, Jared Polis, governor of Colorado.”

Now, shortly, he will make a trip to New York for some meetings and matters related to the gallery. “What is incredible about being here is the ability to move. You can take a two-day trip to New York and it’s like normal. Here people move all the time, there is a great dynamic in the sense of connecting and sharing experiences. In that sense I have felt a lot of receptivity towards me, but very strong.”

–What are your next steps, where do you want to go in the medium term?

–The only thing I always want is to continue discovering new things, opportunities. May my work continue to change, improving. But the truth is that the feeling I have since I arrived is that there is no ceiling, it is like infinity. My career can be projected infinitely to wherever I want or want.

Show in Córdoba

Marcos Acosta will have an exhibition in the Qubo gallery of the Edificor showroom, curated by Carla Peresini. Opening on Wednesday, May 8 at 6 p.m.

To see more of Marcos Acosta’s work

www.marcos-acosta.com

https://hextongallery.com/artists/