Palms 1,2, Damaged 1,3,4,7,9,10, 12, Portraits 2,4,6&7, Moon Face, The Sculptor, The Wrestler, Ghost, Mixed media on paper and canvas, 189x 127 cm average, 2011-13
The Walkers Series, Walker 2&7, epoxy, stone, concrete, rope, metal, pigments, 2013
Bodies of Light (2011-2013)
Bodies of Light source of inspiration is the collection of professional photographer’s magazines from the sixties and seventies my grandad had in his house. I used to make drawings of these fascinating images when I was a little boy and he wanted to keep me quiet. He then just handed these magazines to me so I could make drawings for hours on end.
Portraits of characters from all over the world and aspects of life were somehow talking to me with their very expressive and different faces to what I normally saw on my everyday life growing in the North os Spain. For me drawing became a way to travel in time and space to places, to meet people I seemed to know better the more hours I spent drawing them.
After many years I came across these magazines again which were seriously damaged, pealing off pages due to humidity and lack of usage. The colours were all altered, blurring the image, blending with the backgrounds, it seemed as if the characters I once knew in my imagination where now disintegrating into fading colours and humidity stains. For me to rediscover these pictures was fascinating, I had the urge to draw them again a need to rescue them and on doing so I also damaged the surface of the canvases and papers to capture the effect of these bodies disappearing into damaged backgrounds and over saturated colours.
The making of the stains and damaged surfaces took a life of its own moving some of the works towards abstraction་as the stains and the surfaces became more intriguing than the portrayed figures. A series of sculptures also came along, most of the characters and bodies portrayed in these old magazines would have either aged a lot or more likely had already died. The resulting sculptures and abstract large paintings recall their interpreted persona and energy, a venture to prolong their evanescent presence.
Portraits of characters from all over the world and aspects of life were somehow talking to me with their very expressive and different faces to what I normally saw on my everyday life growing in the North os Spain. For me drawing became a way to travel in time and space to places, to meet people I seemed to know better the more hours I spent drawing them.
After many years I came across these magazines again which were seriously damaged, pealing off pages due to humidity and lack of usage. The colours were all altered, blurring the image, blending with the backgrounds, it seemed as if the characters I once knew in my imagination where now disintegrating into fading colours and humidity stains. For me to rediscover these pictures was fascinating, I had the urge to draw them again a need to rescue them and on doing so I also damaged the surface of the canvases and papers to capture the effect of these bodies disappearing into damaged backgrounds and over saturated colours.
The making of the stains and damaged surfaces took a life of its own moving some of the works towards abstraction་as the stains and the surfaces became more intriguing than the portrayed figures. A series of sculptures also came along, most of the characters and bodies portrayed in these old magazines would have either aged a lot or more likely had already died. The resulting sculptures and abstract large paintings recall their interpreted persona and energy, a venture to prolong their evanescent presence.
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