Ángel Bados
Ángel Bados is an artist and educator who has played a key role in the formation of the group of Basque artists who renewed the syntax of sculpture in the 1980s. Based on the constructivist heritage and the thought of Oteiza, he debates the strategies of modern sculpture and the possibility of its reactivation. In his installations he articulates a critique of the social context through minimalist, conceptual and arte povera languages. Beuys' imprint is continuous throughout his work. The use of natural and found materials that emphasize the processual character of the work, social sculpture and its impact on life, or the question of ritual, are characteristic features of his work. He defends sculpture as a "transforming artifact", which necessarily relates to the space it occupies and intervenes in life.
Ángel Bados (Olazagutia, 1945) lives and works in Bilbao. He holds a degree in Fine Arts from the Royal Academy of San Fernando in Madrid. His reluctant attitude to exhibitions has led him to present his work on very few occasions and at a great distance in time. Nevertheless, his work is present in important public and private collections such as: Fundación Helga de Alvear, Cáceres; Fundación ‘la Caixa’, Barcelona; Museud'Art Contemporani de Barcelona, Barcelona; Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid; Museo Patio Herreriano, Valladolid; Museo Bellas Artes de Bilbao, Bilbao; Artium, Centro-Museo Vasco de Arte Contemporáneo de Vitoria-Gasteiz; Museo San Telmo, Donostia/San Sebastián or in the Museo de Navarra, Pamplona. His teaching activity includes numerous sculpture workshops in different institutions in Spain, most notably those held at Arteleku, some co-directed with Txomin Badiola, which have been a benchmark in the training of new generations of artists. In 2018 he was awarded the National Prize for Plastic Arts.
