Antonio Berni may be generally considered the father of modern Argentine art, but the spiritual mother is, without a doubt, Raquel Forner—a remarkably prolific artist whose work portrayed the frenetic twentieth century. One might think that the role of matriarch would belong to Marta Minujín, but by the time Minujín began experimenting with happenings in the 1960s, Forner was already an established artist, exhibiting her work in the most prestigious art circuits worldwide. For example, in 1958, her work was shown at the Venice Biennale.

Raquel Forner was born on April 22, 1902, in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Her parents were of Spanish origin and enjoyed a comfortable financial situation. During a trip to Spain at the age of 13, she began to take an interest in art and started drawing. In 1922, she graduated as a drawing teacher from the National Academy of Fine Arts (now called the National University of the Arts). At the age of 22, she won third prize at the National Salon of Visual Arts. In 1929, she traveled to Paris to continue her artistic education. There, she joined a group of fellow Argentine artists also studying abroad—such as Butler, Spilimbergo, and Berni—and became the only woman in the so-called "Paris Group." Very little of her work from that period has survived.

Forner's parents supported her artistic career. Family stories say they didn’t give money to her new artist friends, but frequently invited them over for meals—a luxury for many of them who lived in precarious conditions, fully dedicated to their art. In 1936, she married sculptor Alfredo Bigatti, whom she had met during her time in Europe. A year later, the couple built their home and workshop in a purely rationalist style, facing Plaza Dorrego in the historic San Telmo neighborhood. The house, designed by architect Alejo Martínez, reflects their lifestyle centered on artistic production and stands in contrast to the colonial style of the area. Today, it is home to the Forner-Bigatti Foundation, which Raquel herself founded in 1982.

The outbreak of the Spanish Civil War had a profound impact on Forner due to her connection to the country. This led her to begin the Spain series, whose most notable work is Women of the World. A similar process occurred with World War II: in 1939, she began her The Drama series. In 1942, she became the first woman to win the Grand Acquisition Prize at the National Painting Salon with her work The Drama. Behind the white mantle of the figure on the left, we see Forner and Bigatti embracing, watching the scene, clinging to their artworks. That same year, the Museum of Modern Art in New York purchased one of her paintings. These series (Spain, The Drama, The Rocks, The Apocalypse, Pisces, etc.) explore the human condition and its tragedies—wars, violence, massacres—always placing female figures at the forefront.

Alfredo Bigatti is remembered as one of the sculptors of the Monument to the Flag in Rosario. Although it was a collaborative effort due to its scale, this project took more than ten years to complete and was inaugurated in 1957. After its completion, Bigatti's artistic output slowed down. He passed away in March 1964, a devastating loss for Forner. One year later, she painted El Viaje Sin Retorno (The Journey of No Return) in honor of her husband—a monumental polyptych of nine panels measuring 4 meters by 2.75 meters, where she inscribed her magical formula: struggle + love = life, struggle – love = death. Forner and Bigatti were a couple of artists, each with their own name. No one refers to her as “his wife,” nor to him as “her husband.” Each of them created a singular body of work and left their mark on twentieth-century Argentine art.

By the 1950s, Forner’s work began to transition toward new themes. With her 1953 series The Lake, she concluded her earthbound series and began to explore what became known as her “space series.” She started depicting the moon and crafting her own fauna and mythology: the Astroseres (astro-beings). The space race and the moon landing intensified her interest in the cosmos. In these works, we see gray figures representing humans—always anxious and confined—while the Astroseres are multicolored and interconnected. Her fascination with the theme was so strong that in 1974, she visited NASA’s space center. In 1978, she exhibited her work at UNESCO headquarters in Paris, at the organization’s invitation.

Raquel Forner passed away on June 10, 1988, in Buenos Aires. She left behind an unclassifiable body of work that combined styles and embraced multiple media (painting, printmaking, drawing) to portray the anguish of human experience—from war to the existential uncertainty of space exploration. As the artist Alfredo Pior once said of her: “Raquel, you are the one who paints bitterness in the deepest layers of planetary plankton.”