Biography
I was born in Padua, where I currently live and work. I've grown up in this place, on the edge of the city of Buenos Aires. I saw vacant lots turning into houses, I saw pin up calendars on warehouses and grocery stores, I saw paintings of mountains and deers in people’s living rooms, I saw a lot of TV, plans and drawings on the technical school I went to, art installments, paintings in galleries and museums. By that time, I started drawing everywhere. On trains, on my way to art school in Luján. When I graduated we formed mural teams, at the same time I started sending my works to art contests and salons. I reinforced my education by going to workshops by José Ferrari and Roberto Páez. I felt it was necessary for me to have a direct contact with masterworks, its scale and matter. So I travelled all around the US and Europe, visiting Museums, I went to the Sao Paulo Art Biennial and the Venice Art Biennial. When I returned I directed, for several years, the School of Aesthetic Education, in Merlo, and taught at the Universidad de Morón. As I grew tired of pedagogic bureaucracies, I decided to fully dedicate myself to the production and circulation of my own work. I was selected to participate in the Visual Arts workshop of the CC Rojas, where I took a more direct contact with a newer generations of artists, specialists and the Buenos Aires art circuit. During the last times, I did several individual exhibitions in the Galerína Sara García Uriburu, in museums in Luján and the Museo Provincial de La Plata, among others. I also was selected to take part in numerous salons, like the Nacional, Manuel Belgrano, Santa Fé, Chandon, Platt, Andreani and others. I was awarded with numerous prizes and awards, such as:
2008, 1st. Prize, Bienal Regional de Bahía Blanca / 2nd. Prize, Salon Nacional de Pintura, Santa Fé / Honourable mention, Premio Pintura OSRAM Arte Clásica. 2007, 1st. Prize Salón de Pintura San Nicolás/SIDERCA, Mention, II Bienal de Pintura de Rafaela, Honourable Mention, Benito Quinquela Martín Award, Museo de la Boca, 1st. Mention, painting, 4th Salón Nacional de Salta, 2nd. Mention, Bienal Premio Federal CFI. Selected as the representative for the Province of Buenos Aires, to participate in the "Territorios Contemporáneos" (Contemporary territories) travelling exhibition, 1st. Prize, Mercedes Bar Association, painting, Special mention, painting, Salón de Cipoletti. 2006, 1st. Prize, Pintura Luján, 1st. Prize, Pintura Avellaneda Santa Fé, 2nd Prize, Pintura Pergamino, Special honourable mention from the Jury, Salón Arte Sacro Tandil, Jury Mention, Art+Trust award, 2nd Mention, Bienal de Morón. 2006, 1st. Prize, painting award, Salón Nacional de Luján-Félix de Amador, 1st. Prize, painting award, Salón Nacional de Avellaneda, Santa Fé, Honourable mention from the Jury, Art+Trust Award, 2nd. Mention, painting, Salón Provincial de Pergamino, Special Mention from the Jury, Salón de Arte Sacro de Tandil. 2005, 2nd. Prize, painting, Fundación Bollini, 2nd. Prize, painting, Salón Pampeano. 2004, Accésit Certamen Iberoamericano award - painting, Aerolíneas Argentina. 2000, 1st. Prize, painting, IV Octubre award, Buenos Aires. 1995, Honourable mention, panting, Estímulo - Banco Provincia de Buenos Aires award. 1994, Grand prix, "Gobierno de la Provincia de Buenos Aires" painting award. XI triennial salon, La Plata, 1st. Prize, engraving, XV drawing-engraving award, Colegio Ward, Ramos Mejía, Estímulo award, painting, V Bienal de Arte Sacro, Obispado de Morón.
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.
Paúl in vacation just thinks of cards”, and “Paúl and Paúl went picking apples”, these are two oil paintings measuring almost 2 x 2m, that can be read as one, or as two distant stills from a same movie, because of its continuity in terms of time, story, format and aesthetic treatment. The pictorial resolution tries to be as close as possible to the traditional oil painting technique, and the earth-coloured palette turns to be ideal for these images because it gives an antique patina to the contemporary elements that are represented.
I define the style as ‘Improbable realism’, for it tries to come up with a naturalistic representation, but as a result of the crossing between elements picked up from a wide variety of sources (sketchs, pictures –my own, or Internet’s-, souvenirs, toys, inflatables, etc.) and set in a landscape (in most cases, an experienced, closed landscape) that unifies them, generating a tension that I like to investigate upon. The theme, which has been so developed on the titles of these works, is not so clear from the beginning, and I tried to keep it open to further interpretations from the viewer, although it’s clear that there is a certain concern regarding a latent storm threat, or the encounter between animals and dolls, the distrust or the oversight of having left an inflatable toy were my first triggers. But as I executed the painting, other artists and works came to my mind. In the case of “Paúl in vacation…” (the first of the two paintings), I thought that the characters sitting in the van were Cézanne and his little son Paul, and I saw him embroiled in the game, as I thought he surely was embroiled, concerned about his pictorial production, without even considering all the tensions grouping around him and his son, unprotected by this artistic obsession of his father. In exchange, in the other painting, I imagine the two accomplices looking for beauty and abandoning their affairs to their fate, at this point I realice that all self-referential interpretations must not be considered as a mere coincidence.
2. In general terms, how would you suggest to approach your work?
I like my works to be read, not as a catalogue of plastic finds, neither as a formulation of theories, concepts or tendencies (though it’s true that such matters go through my work and define it) but as the occasional photographs of a traveler; someone who has found something to show and to remember.
