Biography
I’m from the town of Candelaria, Misiones, where contact with nature is very important. After I graduated from high school and after travelling for a while, I came to study to Buenos Aires. I got my diploma as a national teacher of painting from the ENBAPP - National School of Fine Arts ‘Prilidiano Pueyrredón’ and once I returned to Posadas, the Bachelor in Theater/Scenography from the USAL / ISPARM. Actually I come and go between Misiones and Buenos Aires, as if looking for balance. In 2006 I finished the validation subjects for the Bachelor in Visual Arts – IUNA-National University Art Institute.
I attended the workshop of Alejandro Vainstein and the work clinic of Tulio de Sagastizábal. I also participated in several drawing, silk screen printing and cultural management courses at INAP/UBA.
I received a scholarship to participate in the Antorchas Foundation Projects realized in Posadas twice; I participated in the 2008 National Painting Award of Banco Nación / Borges Cultural Center, in the 2007 National Art Biennale of Bahía Blanca / MAC and in the 2ND National Painting Biennale in the city of Rafaela / Rómulo Poggi Museum; and in group exhibitions at Recoleta Cultural Center, National Funds for the Arts, Nathan Turner’s in Los Angeles/ USA, Appetite gallery, Libertad Radio Space of Resistencia, Periférica Fair in Arte Chacra, at FUNCEB art gallery, at MMAPDA Museum of Olavarría, at Alliance Française of Bahía Blanca; Materia Urbana, La caja del Pastor, La Habana city; an in the Lucas Braulio Areco Museum of Posadas, René Broceau Provincial Museum of Fine Arts and Nordeste Cultural Center of Resistencia, among others.
I realized solo exhibitions at Elevage Hotel + Gallery Nights; at La Casona de los Olivera; Alliance Française Cultural Center of Buenos Aires; Misiones Cultural Center and at Museum Juan Yaparí of Posadas.
I live and work as a teacher in Buenos Aires since 2001.
Vision of art
1. Choose a work that represents you, describe it in relation to its format and materiality, its relation with time and space, its style and theme; detail its production process.
If I have to choose one work, I would prefer to refer to one of my latest paintings: “Heaven and Earth” [Cielo y Tierra].
It’s a 1.50 x 1.70 cm oil painting on canvas and is part of a series of works where I tried to limit the painting resources, by using the drawing line on an even light blue surface and a considerable amount of material as big spots of light.
In this work, as in the last works, I see a greater expressive intention or tension. Even though, in fact this was always present in my works in a more or less evident
way.
I think this painting sums up everything that I learned during all these years regarding the technique: oil painting was the first media I used when I began to paint but unlike previous works, now the image gets more clear and precise. The colors were carefully chosen and placed on the canvas with determination on some few spots, generating the movement or tension that I think the painting needed. Anyway, I tend to constantly change and to paint in several ways and techniques at the same time. I would say I’m an “itinerant pictorial”, always with doubts and persistent questions.
Although I have worked on some installation projects, I feel that painting is my place and that in that place I travel, varying styles, shapes, researches.
In general, the images that I create suggest personal experiences: visual and auditory impressions of my life in Misiones and Buenos Aires. They are define and diluted in pictorial spaces. However, these spaces are time-spaces. That is to say, I create and paint “temporary” spaces or time-spaces. I’m not so sure how to name it, but I know that somehow the works refer to a present time that is also past, or they refer to a past that becomes a dynamic present through the painting. In any case, I know I speak about time and about my own time.
2. In general terms, how would you suggest to approach your work?
I would not suggest a specific way to read my works. But I’m interested that these are suggestive works for the spectator: because of the images that were created, or the chosen colors or the way they were painted. I mean that if I achieve a good combination of these elements, it will be the painting the one that will invite and take the spectator throughout the work.
3. In reference to your work and your position in the national and international art fields, what tradition do you recognize yourself in? Who are your contemporary referents? What artists of previous generations are of interest to you?
I recognize myself in the tradition of painting and in all those artists that chose these media to express themselves. However, I must mention the influence of the school of Emilio Pettoruti during my first years of training, since Alejandro Vainstein, who was my first teacher of painting, had been his assistant and the one who trasnsmitted this painting School to me.
Regarding contemporary artists, I’m interested in many of them and they work in many different media. I would like to highlight Tulio de Sagastizábal as an artist and teacher and Mónica Giron who taught us how to understand conceptual art in her visits to Posadas with Antorchas Foundation. The friends that I found during all these years: María Blanca Iturralde, Andrés Bancalari, Diego Figueroa, Mariela Scafati, Sonia Abián, Walter Tura, Diego Haboba…well, there are a lot and very good artists. And other artists such as Louise Bourgeois; Alberto Heredia; Julio Le Parc; Francys Alys; Oscar Bony; Claudia Andujar; Illya Kabakov; Gego; Emiliano Centurión; Cildo Meireles; Víctor Grippo; El Anatsui; Pablo Suárez; Lucas Braulio Areco and Ramón Ayala (both of them significant painters and musicians from Misiones) among many. Painters like Francis Bacon; David Hockney; Tarsila do Amaral; Chéri Samba; Luc Tuymans; Marlene Dumas, Izumi Kato or Gerhard Richter for his variety of styles. Alejandro Vainstein; Marcia Schwartz; Fermín Eguía; Antonio Berni and Xul Solar; Batle Planas; Spilimbergo, Butler; Benedit’s watercolors; Florencio Molina Campos; Presas’ colors and so many classical painters: from Miguel Ángel to Goya; El Bosco; Ensor Munch; Lucas Cranach; El Greco; Caravaggio; Turner; the “Ms”: Matta, Magritte and Matisse; from Frida Kahlo to Diego Rivera. I guess at this point: everything that is the history of painting and art, and there’s a lot I still don’t know.
4. Choose works or exhibitions from the last ten or fifteen years which in your opinion were very significant and explain why
I will mention everything I can remember about the exhibitions that for some reason caught my attention. But there are a lot more than the ones I can name right now: León Ferrari’s show that shocked me and the works from Alberto Heredia that left me open-mouthed, both held at MAMBA –Museum of Modern Art of Buenos Aires. Victor Grippo’s exhibition and Berni and his contemporaries at Malba - Museum of Latin American Art of Buenos Aires, like many other shows from Argentinian artists which works are part of the museum collection.
The retrospective exhibitions of: Liliana Porter, Fermín Eguía; Rómulo Macció and Oscar Bony (for the forcefullness of his images) at Recoleta Cultural Center
(also realized at the Spanish Cultural Center of Rosario and later at Malba, if I’m not mistaken) Julio Le Parc’s exhibition at Museum of Porto Alegre, later exhibited in The National Museum of Fine Arts; and Alberto Greco’s show at the same museum. The works from the artists of Rojas Cultural Center; exhibitions organized at Ruth Benzacar gallery, like the one of Marcelo Pombo; Sebastián Gordín or Mónica Girón; among others. Elba Bairon at Braga Menéndez and Recent Antology [Antología reciente], an exhibition of Tulio de Sagastizábal in the MACLA - Museum of Contemporary Art of La Plata. There were also some exhibitions and experiences realized at Belleza y Felicidad; during Estudio Abierto and at FUNCEB’s art gallery.
5. What tendencies or groupings from common elements do you see in argentine art of the last ten or fifteen years?
I can’t stop mentioning how important Antorchas Foundation and Rojas Cultural Center projects have been, in order to make several artists from the provinces have the visibility we have today. On the other hand, thanks to the impetus of the artists that have visited and participated in those projects, many important -and still ongoing - cultural projects were realized.
