With the presence of the   world-renowned name of kinetic art, on September 25 Galeria Nara Roesler | Rio de Janeiro is   inaugurating Julio Le Parc: obras recentes [Julio Le Parc: Recent Works]   in honor of the artist’s 90th birthday (September 23). Accompanied by a text   by Rodrigo Moura, the exhibition features new paintings from the Alchimie series, a sculpture from the Torsion (2004) series, a mobile from the Continuel series,   and Alchimie Virtuel, with technology that allows the spectator to enter the   artist’s universe. This work, in virtual reality, updates the question of   virtuality that Le Parc has been exploring for more than 50 years, including   in the paintings Réels et virtuels / series Surface noir et blanc (1950s), Volume Virtuel (1970s), and the   sculptures Cercle Virtuel (1960s).   By anticipating this discussion, Le Parc became widely recognized as a   visionary.    “Resuming   contact with Le Parc’s works and ideas as he turns 90 years old is an   opportunity for reactivating this belief in the emancipatory role of art –   today without the dogmatism that ruled his initial ideas from within the   kinetic art group – in the hope that it brings an opportunity for   transformation”, writes Rodrigo Moura, in the text he wrote for exhibition.   The current “alchemies,” in acrylic   on canvas, are large-scale works, conceived based on various stages of   drawings and smaller paintings that are expanded in progressively modified   compositions. “In some paintings we see a large black center which,   surrounded by an overlapping of grouped and overlaid colors, appears   atomized, giving rise to a simultaneously disorienting and hypnotic effect,”   says Le Parc. The Alchimie series was begun in 1988, in the form of small sketches   that arose based on chance observations by the artist, which were gradually   realized. “These “alchemies” are part of my living adventure, expressed in my   work as an experimental artist,” Le Parc says.    In Torsion, the artist reaffirms this   persistence in a continuous experimentation, in which each new set of   artworks is rooted in what has been previously developed. The series of   sculptures – which in monumental sizes occupy public spaces of countries such   as Mexico, Portugal and the United States – is linked to the spirit of his   first reliefs, especially the “virtual volumes” developed in the 1970s. Even   though the artworks in the Torsion   series are not virtual, but real with the striking presence of stainless   steel, this material, by its satiny surface, allows multiple changes due to   the way it attracts light. The investigation of the effects of light on the   surface of bodies in movement can also be seen through the hypnotic effect of   his mobiles, represented in the exhibition by the specimen Continuel Mobile Miroir (2017).