Melquiades Rosario Sastre
Morovis, Puerto Rico, 1953
Biography Details
Sculptor, graphic artist and draftsman. Rosario received his artistic training at the Puerto Rico School of Plastic Arts (1975-1978) and at the Art Students League of New York (1981). In 1982, he founded the Puerto Rico Sculptors Association. In 1989, he was awarded the Pollock-Krasner grant. He has been a professor at the School of Plastic Arts, the Art Students League of San Juan and the University of Puerto Rico, he has also participated in artistic events in Puerto Rico and abroad, such as the Havana Biennial (1986) and the San Juan Poli/Gráfica Triennial (2004). In 2006, he received the prestigious grant from the Joan Mitchell Foundation and visited the Vermont Studio Center, where he gathered with artists of all media. He has created sculptures in a variety of materials, from wood to PVC plastic pipes and metal, but most recently has returned to wood as his primary medium. He makes drawings with unconventional methods, such as creating images by lifting layers of paper or tying pencils to remote-control toys that he drives over the base. In the field of sculpture, he is interested in exploring “intangible space as a contained void”.
Artist Statement
“When sculpture became independent of architecture not only did it expect to extract itself from the slavery of an object inside another and dependent from the other, but to find the depth that the object does not have and of the dimensions of the tridimensional object which are not measurable in space, depth is infinite. This displacement from a place to being a place in space, took sculpture, as a logic consequence, to environmental installations, with all its diversities. If we think of the works of Carl Andre, his long track of wooden blocks, proposing distance as another dimension of the sculpture, or the long lines of stone by Richard Long, you will understand the logic of this thinking.
In this displacement towards space, we can see how the place and the space propel frontiers and limits not as that where something ends but where something starts to be what it is.
I understand vacuum as a contained space, not as scarcity but as creation, seen from the object and not from space itself.”
-Melquíades Rosario
Formation
Education
1986
- Bachelor Degree of Sculpture. Escuela de Artes Plásticas de Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1981
- Sculpture Course. The Art Students League, New York, United States
Professional Experience
2013
- Director and Founder. La Fundación Proyecto, San Juan, Puerto Rico
2005-2013
- Sculpture Teacher. Carolina School of Fine Arts, Carolina, Puerto Rico
2005-2006
- Professor. Fine Arts Department, Humanities Faculty, Universidad de Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1998-2001
- Sculpture Professor. Escuela de Artes Plásticas de Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1996-1997
- Wood Sculpture and Modelling Teacher. Art Students League, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1995
- Professor of Sculpture in Wood and of Techniques and Materials. Escuela de Artes Plásticas de Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1991-1993
- Supervisor. Plaster Workshop, Escuela Taller de Ballajá, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1983- 1986
- Assistant Professor. Escuela de Artes Plásticas de Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1981
- Art Counselor. Aspira de las Américas, Bronx, New York, United States
- Artistic Advisor. Padres Unidos, Bronx, New York, United States
Exhibitions
Solo Shows
2013
- Flatten Object, Museo de Arte de Caguas, Caguas, Puerto Rico
2009
- La Línea de mi Pensamiento, Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico
2005
- Dos Décadas: Exposición Retrospectiva, Museo de Historia, Antropología y Arte, Universidad de Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus, San Juan, Puerto Rico
2002
- Comentarios, Galería Viota, Guaynabo, Puerto Rico
1997
- Primera Bienal Iberoamericana, Centro Cultural, Escuela Nacional Autónoma de Bellas Artes, Lima, Peru
1994
- Alegoría a una Cultura, The Chase Manhattan Bank, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1988
- Exposición de Esculturas, Universidad de Puerto Rico, Humacao Campus, Humacao, Puerto Rico
1987
- Exposición de Esculturas, Voluntariado de las Casas Reales, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
1985
- Exposición de Esculturas e Instalación, Convento de los Dominicos, Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña, San Juan, Puerto Rico
Group Shows
2007
- Contexto puertorriqueño: del rococó colonial al arte global, Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico
2004
- Trienal Poli/Gráfica de San Juan, América Latina y el Caribe, Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1995
- Richness & Diversity Contemporary Artists From Puerto Rico & Mexico, The Susquehanna Art Museum, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States
1994
- Islas: Art in Transit, The New Hostos Gallery, Hostos Center for The Art & Culture, Bronx, New York, United States
1990
- 16th International Independent Exhibition of Print, Kanagawa, Japan
- Sculpture of the Americas: Into the Nineties, Art Museum of the Americas, Organization of American States, Washington, DC, United States
1989
- Navia, Suárez, Rosario. Tres Escultores Contemporáneos, Museo de Historia, Antropología y Arte,
- Universidad de Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras Campus, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1988
- VIII Bienal de San Juan del Grabado Latinoamericano y del Caribe, Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1986
- II Bienal de la Habana, Centro Cultural Wilfredo Lam, Havana, Cuba
1985
- Primer Simposio Iberoamericano de Escultura, Galería de Arte Moderno de Santo Domingo, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
Awards, Distinctions and Achievements
2006
- Grant Award by Nomination. The Joan Mitchell Foundation, Inc., New York, United States
1999
- Artistic Excellence Medal. Asociación Puertorriqueña de Artistas Plásticos, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1993
- First Prize. Segundo Certamen Nacional, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1991
- Honorable Mention. Primer Certamen Nacional, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico
1989
- Grant. Pollock-Krasner Foundation, New York, United States
1980
- First Prize in Sculpture. Certamen de Navidad, Ateneo Puertorriqueño, San Juan, Puerto Rico
Collections
- Compañía de Turismo de Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico
- Art Museum of the Americas, Organization of American States, Washington DC, United States
- The Chase Manhattan Bank Collection, New York, United States
- First Bank, San Juan, Puerto Rico
- Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico
- Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico
- Museo de Historia, Antropología y Arte, Universidad de Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras Campus, San Juan, Puerto Rico
- Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, United States
- Museum of Latin American Art, Long Beach, California, United States
- Snite Museum of Art, University of Notre Dame, Indiana, United States
- Susquehanna Art Museum, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States
- Voluntariado de las Casas Reales, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
Bibliography
Catalogues
Pau-Llosa, Ricardo. García-Gutiérrez, Enrique y de Tolentino, Marianne “Melquíades Rosario Sastre: Dos Décadas” Catálogo de Exposición Retrospectiva: Museo de Antropología, Historia, y Arte, Universidad de Puerto Rico. Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico y Viota Gallery, San Juan, Puerto Rico, febrero de 2005.
Rivera Matos, Rubén. “El Arte de Melquíades Rosario Sastre; Algunas Implicaciones Ideológicas”, Catálogo de Exposición Individual, Convento de los Dominicos, Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña, San Juan, Puerto Rico, abril de 1985.
Rivera Rosario, Nelson “El Arte de Melquíades Rosario Sastre”, Catálogo de Exposición individual, Voluntariado de las Casas Reales, Santo Domingo, República Dominicana, abril de 1987.
Pérez Lizano, Manuel “Maderas con Filo”, Catálogo de Exposición Individual, Universidad de Puerto Rico, Recinto de Mayagüez, Puerto Rico, septiembre de 1987.
De Tolentino, Marianne. “Melquíades Rosario o la Riqueza Visual y Conceptual de una Escultura Pobre”, Catálogo, exposición Individual, Galería Oller, Universidad de Puerto Rico, Río Piedras , Puerto Rico, marzo de 1988.
Pau-llosa, Ricardo “Melquíades Rosario Sastre: De Materia y Tropos”, Catálogo, Exposición. The Chase Manhattan Bank, Hato Rey, Puerto Rico, marzo de 1994.
“La Imaginación Quiástica en la Escultura e Instalaciones de Melquíades Rosario”, Catálogo, Primera Bienal Iberoamericana, Lima Perú, septiembre de 1997.
Books
García Gutiérrez, Enrique, “Latin American Art in The Twentieth Century”, Phaidon Press, Editor; Edward J. Sullivan, 1996.
Routte- Gómez, Eneid “Conversando con Nuestros Artistas”, San Juan, Puerto Rico: Publicado Por El Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico, 1998.
Magazines
Joung King,Jin. “Melquíades Rosario Sastre”, Revista de Arte “Art World” (Seúl, Korea), Núm. Vlll , agosto de 1988.
Pau-Llosa, Ricardo. “Melquíades Rosario Sastre: Space as Body”, Sculpture: International Sculpture Center, septiembre de 1997.
Pau-Llosa, Ricardo. “Beyond Tensión: Melquíades Rosario & The New Sculpture”, Southward Art: Latin American Art Review, (Florida, EU), marzo de 2002.
Pau-Llosa, Ricardo. “Melquíades Rosario Sastre: Cuando La Maestría Realmente Significa Algo”, Arte Al Día International, (Miami, EU), abril de 2005.
Álvarez -Lezama, Manuel. “Los Objetos de Rosario Sastre”, Diálogo-Zona Cultural, Publicación de la Universidad de Puerto Rico, (San Juan, PR), marzo de 2005.