Antología de canciones / Anthology of Songs
(Curated by Gabriel Rolt for The Curators Room)
ELOY ARRIBAS
Los Pintores 2
Acrylics on canvas
162 x 195 cm
2023
(detail)
(detail)
ELOY ARRIBAS
Los Pintores 1
Acrylics on canvas
150 x 150 cm
2023
ELOY ARRIBAS
la Fuente
Acrylics on canvas
146 x 116 cm
2023
ELOY ARRIBAS
La pared-horizontal
Oil on canvas
150 x 114 cm
2023
ELOY ARRIBAS
Brindis
Acrylics on canvas
150 x 130 cm
2023
ELOY ARRIBAS
El desfile
Acrylics on canvas
146 x 114 cm
2023
ELOY ARRIBAS
El Sol
Acrylics on canvas
50 x 40 cm
2023
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ELOY ARRIBAS
Antología de canciones / Anthology of Songs
(Curated by Gabriel Rolt for The Curators Room)
10 June 2023 – 30 June 2023
This week, The Curators Room – East —a new ephemeral exhibition space opening especially for the occasion of the show— welcomes the work of Eloy Arribas (Valladolid, 1991). This solo show contains 12 of the newest works by the young Spanish painter which showcases an unusual style for Arribas. In regards to the overlying narrative of the show, Arribas imagines a kind of dialectical play between an array of objects in which his delicate and ghostly brushstroke immerses the viewer in a kind of phantasmagorical dreamscape.
With little visual perspective, the artist etches outlined figures that oscillate between the sublime and the surreal. Kafkaesque, balletic forms caress the surface of his canvases as well as thick grooves and mounds of paint that give a sculptural dimension to the pieces. Highlighting the lyrical and percussive element of the work is essential to understanding the artist’s methodological beginnings.
The whimsical and almost childlike atmosphere of the work liberates it from any fixed or determinate meaning. Rather, the artist opts for a shroud of mystery that effuses over the work. Iconographies reminiscent of a universal mythology that is divorced form any social structure, geography, political system or cultural construct. Anthropomorphic, chalky objects and humanoid characters dance in this no-place; a kind of mystical wonderland coming from the most uncanny spaces in the subconscious.
In words of the artist himself, “this body of work differs from the work I usually create —paintings that have much to do with the idea of visual rhythm, limited space (the idea of the table and stochastic) and with the composition of music. In this series I channel figuration as ‘lyrics of the songs.’ Playing with an archetypal iconography and its ability to produce literary narratives, stories as well as characters and scenarios as if they were part of a saga or commedia dell’arte.”
He continues, “this reflection around painting contains a mythological element: the technique I use to produce the pieces tends to refer to that. I work on a wax plate on which I draw a matrix with a burin. Using the strappo techn ique (like the Romanesque chapels of the Museu Nacional d’Art Contemporani) I extract the drawing from the matrix, resulting in a relief image that preserves the errors and the memory of the wax matrix.”
Arribas works have been exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions, traveling to countries such as the United States, Italy, Denmark, Austria and France. His presence has also been found in a diversity of spaces pertaining to the national panorama: The Curators Room (Barcelona/Amsterdam), SEISMASUNO PROJECTS, Galería Herrero de Tejada, Arniches 26 in Madrid, Centro Parraga in Murcia, Da2 in Salamanca or the Galería Miquel Alzueta in Barcelona.
Gabriel Virgilio Luciani
