- Everyday Universe - Curated by Rosemary Rodríguez with works by Hector Frank and Abel López

Everyday Universe – Curated By Rosemary Rodríguez – Works by Hector Frank and Abel López

The art historian and curator Rosemary Rodríguez (* Havanna, 1984) shows in the exhibition EVERYDAY UNIVERSE with works of Hektor Frank (* Havana, 1961) and Abel López (* Havanna, 1985), how scarcity gives rise to artistic impulses.

In Cuba, in the early 1990s, when the former Soviet Union ceased to exist and the gross national product of Cuba collapsed by more than 30%. Practically over nicht everything became scarce, including canvas, paper or paint – but not creativity.

The curator shows current works by both artists, in which this creativity of scarcity still lives on today as an essential feature of the work.

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Mabel Poblet – FLASHBACK –

THE POETRY OF MEMORY – By Virginia Alberdi –

In visual arts, Mabel Poblet applies a practice deeply rooted in the history of culture: the documentation of voyages. Since ancient times, travelers have made accounts of their voyages. These chronicles, regardless of their diversity and of the time when they were written, usually aimed at discovering and, at the same time, sharing new experiences.

For Mabel, however, the story is not important. Each piece – or page – in the diary focuses on the impressions on the senses, on the memories, and works as a palimpsest. Overlapped layers of memories become stitched with the idea of accumulation and synthesis, two concepts that might seem opposed but which are not, given the integrating nature of the resulting artwork.

The viewer does not have to find chronological or specific references of the origin or the circumstances of each image. Relevant is what lives inside each piece, or, in other words, the perception of being in front of a mosaic where the meaning goes beyond the specificity of history.

Therefore, we are witnessing a proposal in which the orientation of the senses is more than a simple anecdote. Fragments come together as the articulation of many realities leading to a new reality. This is possible because the artist works from the suggestions of poetry while urging the viewer to build a metaphor of the trip, a memory that can be either his own or the one of others.

Of course, the viewer must discover the key to each visual work. There are cities, urban grids evident in two of the works in the series. Another work focuses on the physical reflection of barrenness, on the impact of time on the physical reality of the urban landscape that leaves on the pupil an incandescent imprint related to the erosion produced by days. In another, also harmonically conceived, streets, houses, doors, facades, all from diverse origin, reveal itineraries that were once certain and now become a lyrical evocation of places that could have been a dream.

Mabel emphasises the evocative geometry of the pyramids. She even makes pyramids look as formations exceeding the two-dimension scale. This type of structure certainly encloses a kind of Pythagoras-style mystery due to the regularity of the proportions, its antique lineage and the assumption of its virtues as reservoirs of spiritual energies. However, because the artist presents the structures in thoroughly worked textures, the impression one gets cannot be reduced to mere symbolic speculation. The pyramids in these works refer to an existential pleasure that we can interpret freely as personal pleasure in our own life.

Nevertheless, let us return to the dominance of landscapes in this exhibition. Whoever wants to become immersed in the vastness of the ocean and the open spaces can do so through the works in which predominating blues stimulate a most serene contemplation. Whoever intends to breathe in the atmosphere of a garden, which is the sum of all possible and impossible gardens, will have at his or her hands those flowers that explode with the passion of a soft and inspiring fire.

The only limit for Mabel Poblet is the circumference. Everything can fit inside it and nothing exists outside the circular armature. The circumference is the pre-established border so that nothing can escape from the imagination. For the artist, this is the definition of the vital cycle. The materials used are also submitted to that principle. Clips of photographs, acetate sheets, fixers and other elements interact as support for those visions concentrically structured, as if the fragments responded to the logic of an agglutinating dynamic force without we can never do.

Aimed at not exhausting herself, however, the artist opens a surprising gate in the exhibition sequence. A work she considers a “penetrable” space, and which is nothing else than a performatic installation, introduces the viewer into another aesthetic dimension. Not viewer anymore, one becomes the protagonist of one’s own voyage immersed in a space of sheets, mirrors, lights and shadows to experiment the progress of the voyage accompanied by sounds complementing the adventure of the senses. Vision, touch and hearing unfold their potential through the duet formed by Poblet and the creative talent of Andres Levin, Venezuelan-born producer and composer of acknowledged credentials in fusion music applied in performing arts.

Every voyage is a way of learning. Mabel Poblet does not return to Ithaca empty-handed, on the contrary she returns with her hands full of images plethoric of meaning and beauty. Certainly, this harvest will have a profound impact in the sensitivity of those who get inspired by these images to undertake their own voyages.

Mabel Poblet (*1986 in Cienfuegos) graduated from both “San Alejandro” Art Academy and the University of the Arts (ISA) with top grades. Her distinctive, penetrating style has made her one of the best-known visual artists in Cuba. She currently lives and works in Havana.

Poblet’s works from her exhibition FLASHBACK are best described as creative constellations; the circular, kaleidoscopic compositions are made up of a series of associations, pieced together like a mosaic. Her works create an intimate dreamscape, a ‘starry map’ of her experiences, thoughts and collective memories. Her orb-like wall sculptures explore landscapes ranging from oceans to cities, and are uniquely created with materials like photographs, acetate sheets and light itself. Her multi-sensory ‘penetrable’ installation offers a space for reflection and escape, immersing the viewer in sound and light. Perhaps the most poignant aspect of Poblet’s installations is the invitation she extends to her viewer, inviting them to explore not only her own life, but to embark upon a voyage of their own.

ArteMorfosis invites you and your friends:

Opening: Thursday, August 23, 2018, 6 pm – Mabel Poblet will be present

Exhibition: August 24 through October 6, 2018 – An exhibition catalog is available

EL HILO ROJO – curated by Sandra De Giorgi

The works of this exhibition are all united by one common thread, the color red. Despite using different styles, each artist is united by the passionate language of red. The use of red can be traced throughout art history; artists have used red to convey passion, royalty, violence, sensuality, and contrast. Red is intense, elemental and dramatic. It can be lucky, protective or political. Its symbolic value is endless.

Thread of Red

The title of this exhibition has both literal and symbolic meaning. It references the exhibition’s focus on works depicting the color ‘red’. The phrase also references an overarching idea; while these works are clearly connected by their color scheme, these connections go far deeper. Chinese legend refers to the ‘red thread of fate’, an invisible cord that binds those destined to meet one another, similar to soulmates. While these artists may not be soulmates, perhaps there is an element of destiny in the way the color red has continued to manifest itself throughout history. A look at the symbolic and emotional value of the color red shows how these artists are part of a local and universal ‘red thread’.

Cultural value of ‘red’

The political connotations of red may at first glance be the most obvious Cuban connection. Red is traditionally associated with communism; living in a communist country, Cuban artists could use red to represent their allegiance to this system. In Cuba, red also has protective properties. The color is often displayed at the entrance of a household in order to ward off negative thoughts and energy, keeping them outside the house. Similarly, Chinese culture has a strong connection to red, one that the artists in this exhibition are aware of. In China, red symbolizes good fortune, luck, and happiness, and is seen in abundance during Chinese holidays and gatherings. Like Cuba, China’s communist government adds another symbolic layer to red. Flora Fong and Gilberto Frómeta’s use of red is clearly influenced by the color’s significance in Chinese culture.

Red’s Art History

While red has clear ties to Cuba, the artists of this exhibition are also part of a larger art story. The symbolism of red goes beyond local cultures, becoming part of a universal understanding.

Red is the color of passion. Red’s history of passion goes back to one of humanity’s greatest dramas: the Passion of Christ. In Renaissance altarpieces and triptychs, artists like Matthias Grünewald would use red to symbolize Christ’s passion and the blood he shed for humankind. Artists in this exhibition and throughout history have taken advantage of red’s passionate connotations. Women are depicted in red tones and with red lips. It seems a portrait of a woman is not complete without some rouge on her lips. The rococo artist François Boucher’s Portrait of Mme de Pompadour at her Toilette (1758) certainly attests to that. Depicted applying make-up, Louis XV’s mistress is the embodiment of female beauty. The red she applies to her lips is symbolic of her seductive qualities. Eduardo Roca (‘Choco’), Lancelot Alonso and Carlos Quintana follow this tradition; their portraits of women all display red lips, a universal symbol of feminine charm.

Red is a color of challenge. When we ‘see red’ we are often challenged by its intensity and its boldness. Franz Marc, a German expressionist, was very interested in the symbolism of color. He saw red as brutal and heavy, a color to be opposed and overcome by other colors like blue and yellow. His work, Fighting Forms (1914), shows the challenge red poses in relation to the other colors and the dynamism with which it fights back. Red can be used as an effective contrast; its intensity often needs to be balanced out. Piet Mondrian used red with other colors to create a universal harmony of line and color. Similarly, artists in this exhibition like Zaida del Río and Osy Milian use red as an accent in their works to create balance. Red is used to draw attention to certain elements without overwhelming the entire composition.

Artists have used red’s challenging quality to convey political unrest. Andy Warhols’ Red Race Riot (1963) depicts the violence of the civil right movement in Birmingham, Alabama. The entire image is seen through a red wash, immediately creating an intense drama. Duvier del Dago, whose works are the most explicitly political, often used red as the only color in his works, indicative of red’s connotations of unrest.

Finally, red can challenge our vision of the natural world. Like expressionists and symbolists, many artists in this exhibition use red emotionally rather than realistically. Edvard Munch painted his sky an unnatural red in The Scream (1893), conveying the anxiety of the end of the century. Paul Gaugin uses a red background in The Vision of the Sermon (1888) to emphasize the dream-like quality of the vision. The Cuban artists Ernesto García Peña, Alicia Leal and Pedro Pablo Oliva all use red to a similar effect. They create a dream-like ‘unreality’, where red is more than just a color, it is a feeling.

Artists in this exhibition envision red in varying ways: as the dominant trait of a painting or as an accent to draw attention to a work’s focal point. They paint lustful lips, fiery hair and crimson skies. Each artist uses red to enhance the work’s story, recalling a passion that is both artistic and Cuban. While each artist is firmly influenced by their Cuban heritage, their dynamic use of this vibrant color is part of greater artistic narrative. They speak to an increasingly globalized world in the most universal of languages.

De Giorgi asks: ‘Imagine walking into the gallery and seeing only red; red works and red emotions. In red my eyes have seen love, tension and harmony. What do you see?’

Carlos Quintana – Passage

– by David Mateo, Art Critic, Habana, 2018 –

Carlos Quintana (*1966, Havana) began his artistic career as a sketcher and painter in Cuba in the early 1990s.His pictures from this period show clear features of neo-expressionism.At the time, this stylistic orientation was characteristic of other contemporary painters in Cuba.His works showed the influence of paradigmatic artists such as Schnabel, Baselitz, Kiefer and Kippenberger.Nevertheless, Quintana was not granted a rapid rise in the national art scene of Cuba.One reason for this was that as a painter he was formally traveling on alternative paths and did not participate in collective projects.He was a kind of renegade “underground” artist. His pictorial works included disturbing codes and discourses, as well as an almost obsessive interest in bearing witness to those offensive life pages that also showed the violence and the filth of everyday life.

Carlos Quintana

In 1993, Quintana met the Spanish gallery owner Ángel Romero. With his help, he was able to travel to Spain and settle down there. In 1994, Romero invited him to take part at the “Feria del Arco” and there he successfully introduced himself into the international art scene. From Spain, interest in Quintana´s work gas grown in other countries, too, so he exhibited his paintings in the United States, Mexico, Germany and France. Like many other Cuban, exile artists and intellectuals, Quintana first in gained fame and recognition abroad, before becoming successful in his own country. In 2006, his “Lateralidad cruzada” exhibition in the Galería Habana, directed by Luis Miret, successfully placed Quintana in the Cuban artistic scene and became a reference artist for the local neo-expressionist painting.

The process of integration and artistic legitimacy started first from a morphological perspective. Technically, Quintana offered overwhelming evidence about his potential as a sketcher. Here, I refer to his drawing procedures, which serve as a basis and design, and then continue to work with gestural brushstrokes, dripping, with tonal gradations, with a glaze color and different fillings. The eclectic and polished treatment of his compositions and the anarchical symbolic connections that pose its individual visual illusions and his resourceful representation of objects, and especially of people, shows that he is part of both the classical and contemporary artistic currents. His work shows modernist as well as traditional features. All that explains his important role in the artistic Cuban world. This way, Quintana´s work changes into something pagan, ceremonial and at the same time, thanks to its new free and relaxed brushstroke. Very important and obvious to him is the fusion of the simple geometry of Afro-Cuban iconography with a gesture that refers to the curvy oriental line. The combination of these two elements is one of the typical characteristics of Quintana´s artistic mastery. At the same time, in contrast to this way of uniting different symbols, there is a symbiosis of ciphers that he has brilliantly integrated into his work for a quarter of a century. These symbols have developed a life of their own and reveal the Cuban cultural roots from which they come.These roots are obvious from time to time, which makes the viewer amazed.This is Quintana’s contribution to Cuban painting.The young painters of Cubamay notdareto follow Quintana’s stylebecause of their restrainedmanner, although his influences are evident in their works.It is Quintana’s independence as a bohemian what they could not directly adopt for themselves in this way.

Symbolically, Quintana’s works fit very well into the evolution of Cuban art.His involvement as a paintershows atypicaltraits that other artists such as José Bedia, Elso Padilla, Rubén Torres Llorca or Santiago RodriguezOlazabal have also followed.Quintana, however, has something unique in his work that does not exist in the complete artistic stream surrounding him: the dialoguebetween what is mystical and secularization. Quintana uses the most diverse symbols and codes side by side, and they have their origins in the African andEasternreligious worlds.We might think that the sole reason for this is a free (and liberated)extraversionto the symbolic heritage that accompanies the artist.This is also the source of an important recourse to our own cosmos, with its ciphers and symbols, in which the anarchy of thought and life finds a significant expression.

Apart from this vast amount of cultural roots, the works of Quintana have uncovered new arguments and formulas that allow an encounter between past and present, the ancient and the contemporary.His works contain a voluptuous freedom and at the same time a local bond, which are reflected in the symbols he chooses.It is about a kind of reference that allows us to reflect on the influence of history and, at the same time, toenlightenus about theglobal significance ofthese cultural origins, which are independent ofgeography.

Before he appeared on the Cuban art scene, other artists have already left their mark on the new adaptation, which suggests a rearrangement of Eastern and Caribbean iconography.At the same time, another group of artists has sought in a much more reduced way a more direct comparison of cultural and ideological prescriptions.Many of these artists could only make limited markings as they explored concepts of Hinduism and Buddhism, as well as the influence of yoga and Zen.I believe that this bias has a legitimacy that is more rational than physical, more gnostic than representative.

With the new attention paid to painting in Cuba in the period 1990-2000, these tendencies have reawakened and left other traces in the specific areas of the creation of symbols, especially in the two-dimensional work of Quintana.He was also one of the pioneers of this flow.In any pictorial composition of Quintana, we can capture a plethora of emblematic symbols that occur both individually and as a whole.They are unique in this way in the fine arts of Cuba at the end of the last century.The African andEasterntrait of his work are what captures the eye.His work repeats the presence of different animals, a surrealist mix of atypical creatures of aspecific ethnic and religiousorigin: dog, ram, horse, camel.A clear assignment of these attributes is not possible: they overlap in his work, obviously.

Quintana makes drawings of groups of people standing or in motion, sometimes showing data about them, a Tibetan monk or a samurai.However, these can also be thought of as being for other people who could come from an Afro-Cuban or Buddhist environment.In the phantasmagoric references, we usually discover a real person from everyday life (a friend, a girlfriend, a relative …).There are also traces of anepic or mythologicalperson.The heads that the viewer sees emerging from his images often have the physiognomy of a Buddhist statue or resemble a Creole prototype oftheElegguà, an Afro-Cuban deity.

Everything is related, casual, superimposed in a present and representative logic.That is why I do not want to put his work on a single interpretive pedestal.If we look at a reevaluation of his work today, we can see the force and speed of Quintana’s formal transitions and cross-cultural leaps that always have a spiritual edge.The titles of his works are very indicative of this phenomenon.These short explanations or exclamationsreflectthe intimate look ofthe author’scircumstances.

Carlos Quintana has recently focused artistically on abstraction, on various image carriers such as canvas, cardboard, mirrors and in the context of installations.He recently opened an exhibition entitled “Quintana abstracto” at the “Gran Teatro de La Habana”.Here not only the works are abstract, but also the arrangement of these is hermetic and enigmatic.I think that his abstract works can be deduced from his method of assemblage and his intensive work as a sketcher and painter.Many of his earlier paintings already suggest this step into the abstract.Some time ago, I noticed that his pictures “emptied”, things and objects began to float in them.Added to this was his gestural attitude: all this prepared the step into abstraction.

There is no doubt that his pictures still tend to be figurativeExpressionism.The current exhibition at the Swiss Galerie Artemorfosis in Zurich particularly emphasizes the human figure, the female nude and the portraits.Quintana has a unique talent for these genres.All his portrayed figures seem to be taken from everyday life, they reflect, claim their legitimacy, show their fear, a scar, or even constitute a surreal delirium. On the one hand, Quintana iscosmopolitan,on the other hand, a regionalist. From another perspective, he is a performer who clings to a ritual, preferring interventions and installative pieces.His pictures appear clearer from a distance, giving the impression of a flight of the Creator.In the process, foreign certainties also manifest themselves in his artistic work, thus creating a distance to the viewer.At the same time, Quintana seems to cling to its cultural roots to nourish our throats with this confusion.

Havana, 2018

Purchase works from Carlos Quintana online on Artsy