Meet the Artist:
Rubén Guerrero
Often the work of Rubén Guerrero is constructed thanks to complex relationships: Is he referring to a model? Perhaps it is related to the canvas that he was painting next to it? Are the drawings part of the process? How important can that nod towards avant-garde be? The narrative of his work is not linear, the possibilities of one painting are endless and his work can be read in multiple forms. It is the viewer who must take on the challenge; his refusal to represent space sets a trap before our eyes. It forces us into a moment of reflection.
Despite the effort, it’s always a satisfactory exercise to connect with the different readings of his work, its final reward being a painting that stands up for itself.
This is why, in Meet the Artist: Rubén Guerrero presents the large format canvas Personaje Suprematista (Suprematist Character) which, accompanied by three of his drawings, brings us closer to the thoughts, the context and ways of making of the artist.
Charcoal on paper / Adhesive tape on enamelled paper. 36 x 27 x 3.5 cm (Each one)
“I have always thought that the studio is a place that has its own activity parallel to mine and which I take advantage off. I share my daily life with a vast arsenal of objects that seduced me for some reason and that little by little form alliances and unsuspected relationships until at some point, perhaps due to persistence, they manage to convince me to use them as part of some future work.”
Charcoal on paper. 36 x 27 x 3.5 cm
Charcoal on paper. 36 x 27 x 3.5 cm
Oil and enamel on canvas. 240 x 155 cm
“My motives are assumptions that have taken on visible substance, they are close to being something recognizable, they have the echo and the familiarity that comes with closeness, but release a feeling of doubt, that is where I’m interested in placing my work; between the recognizable and the comprehensible.”
“There is a certain natural logic in the destruction of the models that served as a starting point for the paintings, I understand it as a necessary and almost biological event that justifies the self-sufficiency of the painting.”
“In reference to models, I often think of this text by Gertrud Stein in Lectures in America: ‘The relation between the oil painting and the thing painted was really nobody’s business. It could be the oil painting’s business but actually for the purpose of the oil painting after the oil painting was painted it was not the oil painting’s business and so it was nobody’s business’.”
“References to art history are present in many of my works, it amuses me to recognize myself in artists from the historic avant-garde, as it happens with Malevich and his work Suprematist Character in this case, I refer specifically to his very well-known paintings of characters without faces or Black Cross.“
“In my work, the drawing is a vital exercise, it supposes a counterpoint necessary to painting. Even with the shared interest for geometry and a certain gestural containment fundamental difference exists between the two practices that affects its execution: In my painting, the thought precedes the execution and in the drawing is simultaneous.”
Adhesive tape on enameled paper. 36 x 27 x 3.5 cm
To inquire about an artwork: [email protected]
Art Direction and Project Management: Virginia Murcia
Artworks Photography: David Zarzoso
Studio Photography and Video: Óscar Romero
Translation: Maya Guerrero
2021
