Background
Lidy Prati was born in 1921 in Resistencia, Chaco, Argentina.
Lidy Prati was born in 1921 in Resistencia, Chaco, Argentina.
Lidy Prati made her first exhibition at the Salon Peuser in Buenos Aires at an early age, in 1942. She was also the author of the vignettes for the only issue of Arturo magazine, published in 1944. In November 1945 she took part in the Asociación Arte Concreto-Invención and signed the Inventionist Manifesto published in Arte Concreto magazine Nº 1, in August 1946.
Lidy's work, exploring a vast repertoire of geometric forms, bands of colors and juxtaposition games, attracted the interest of the concrete artist Max Bill. She also worked as a designer in graphic arts as well as in textiles and jewels. During the 40s she participated in the exhibitions of the Asociación Arte Concreto-Invención, and in 1950 she took part in the Arte Concreto show at the Instituto de Arte Moderno, Buenos Aires.
In 1951 Lidy Prati collaborated with the Nueva Visión cultural magazine. In 1952 she traveled to Europe, visiting several countries where she met Max Bill and Georges Vantongerloo among others. At the request of Aldo Pellegrini, in 1952, she became a member of the Group of Modern Artists of Argentina, together with Maldonado, Hlito, Lommi, Claudio Girola, Antonio Fernández Muro, Sarah Grilo, and Miguel Ocampo, participating in the group’s exhibitions in Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, and Amsterdam.
In 1954 her works – reflecting her pursuit of the problems of colors – were exhibited at the Biennial International Exhibition of San Pablo. In 1963 Prati took part in the Twenty Years of Concrete Art exhibition organized by the Museo de Arte Moderno, Buenos Aires, also designing its poster and logotype. Then in 1970 Prati co-founded the magazine Artina with the artists Germaine Derbecq, Silvia de Ambrosini, and Odile Baron Supervielle.
Lidy's works were included in the Latin American Artists of the Twentieth Century exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, New York in 1993 and in the Art from Argentina 1920/1994 exhibition opened at Modern Art Oxford in 1994, a travelling exhibition that after visiting several European countries, was closed at the Centro Cultural Borges, Buenos Aires, in 1995. She recently participated in the Abstract Art from the Rio de la Plata, Buenos Aires and Montevideo 1933/1953 exhibition at The Americas Society of New York in 2001. Lidy Prati died in Buenos Aires in 2008.
Lidy Prati adhered to the artistic traditions of Concrete Art (Concretism).
During the 1940s, Prati was one of the founding members of the Asociación Arte Concreto-Invención art movement (or Concrete-Invention Art Association).
Lidy married her fellow artist Tomás Maldonado in 1944.
