Pepe Cobo

Pepe Cobo - Canton Flowers XII

Technique: Hand-made ceramics

Artist Biography: Pepe Cobo inaugurates in 1984, in Seville, the gallery known as La Máquina Española, starting his work with a group of artists associated with the magazine Figura (Guillermo Paneque, Federico Guzman, Rafael Agredano or Pepe Espaliú among others) who sought to react to the pictorial tradition in Spain and the stagnant state of the art scene. The Spanish Machine seeks to look outward and, given the socio-economic characteristics of the time (Spain and its autonomous regions) to combine the idea of art without borders with a combination of Andalusian and foreign artists of the most rabid contemporaneity, also attending the most relevant international art fairs of the moment: Art Basel, Chicago, FIAC, ARCO, Los Angeles and Cologne. In 1988 he moved La Máquina Española to Madrid, which opened in January of that year with an exhibition of the American artist Cindy Sherman, and where he continued to develop the programming line of his gallery with artists such as Bernard Frieze, James Lee Byars or Jonathan Borofsky, while creating and advising important collections of contemporary art. In addition to this, in 1991, together with two of the most important gallerists of the New York art scene at the time, John Weber and Brooke Alexander, he opened Weber, Alexander y Cobo in Madrid, where great exhibition projects -both for the importance of their artists and for the spectacular space they had available- of renowned international artists such as Robert Mapplethorpe, James Rosenquist, John Baldessari, Jasper Johns, Sol Lewitt and Richard Tuttle, among others, could be seen. In 1994 he closed all the galleries in Madrid and returned to Seville, dedicating himself at this time to artistic advisory and consultancy activities and organizing the Hotel y Arte project in Seville, which began in 1997 and lasted until the year 2000. In 1999 he reopened his gallery in Seville as Galería Pepe Cobo, continuing with the line of work he had followed until then and incorporating new artists. In 2005, Pepe Cobo Gallery moves to Madrid following the line of work started with La Máquina Española and working with national and international artists of the latest trends in contemporary art through exhibitions and its participation in contemporary art fairs around the world: Art Basel, Art Basel Miami Beach, Frieze Art Fair, The Armory Show and ARCO. 2009 is the year of Pepe Cobo's new project: Cambio de aceite, an art space that used to be a vehicle repair shop. Far from the traditional neutral white-walled gallery cube, this new space maintains its initial and structural characteristics with the aim of being an incentive and a challenge for contemporary creators. In addition to the aforementioned gallery and advisory trajectory, Pepe Cobo also has a long history of curating exhibitions and has been part of the advisory committee of the Chicago Contemporary Art Fair, Arte Lisboa 2001 and also of ARCO International Contemporary Art Fair of Madrid during the years 2001-2003 and 2005-2008. Pepe Cobo is also an advisor to important private and corporate collections, such as the ACS Collection, the Bergé Collection and the MP Collection, having also advised on the installation of works specifically designed for Torre Espacio (OHL), in 2008-2009, as well as advising the HL1 Collection. Peru and more specifically Lima is a new challenge for Pepe Cobo, which means -in his long experience of almost thirty years in the world of the international market- to introduce, contribute and open to this country -a place of so much history and traditions, at a time of outward visibility- such experience, art and artists of the world, as well as to advise and initiate contemporary art collections to large companies. Thus, he opens his latest gallery pepe cobo y cia in the Peruvian capital. All this is materialized by creating exhibitions that will be based on a title or theme, as the first one -opened on November 21, 2013- with the title "Silhouettes and portraits of women", with artists such as Picasso, Picabia, Polke, Ruscha, Saura, Balkenhol, Sandra Gamarra or Pepe Espaliú. Currently, Pepe Cobo is dedicated to the management, coordination and advising of large projects, having left the role of gallerist since he closed his gallery in Lima in 2016.