GAMALIEL RODRIGUEZ’S  LANDVIEW AT

WALTER OTEREO CONTEMPORARY ART

 

San Juan, PUERTO RICO- Walter Otero Contemporary Art (WOCA) is pleased to present Gamaliel Rodríguez’s first solo exhibit, LANDVIEW, on view September 4 until October 15, 2014, at the contemporary art space located in Puerta de Tierra in San Juan.

 

Gamaliel Rodríguez (b. 1977 Bayamón, Puerto Rico) obtained a MA in Visual Arts at the Kent Institute of Art and Design in Kent and the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in 2011.

 

The artist works mainly with drawings which he uses with historical backgrounds and its re-interpretation into the 21th century. His work explores the aesthetic and the visual quality created by drawings and paintings with ballpoint pen and felt tip pen (Sharpie).

 

With impressive meticulousness and precision, he uses felt-tip pen and acrylic to produce a series of aerial views of industrial, military or civilian areas that have a quality of printmaking but done with drawing on canvas, making a reference between old illustrations, printmaking and old declassified photographs. 

 

The idea behind his work is to generate a state of nostalgia and obscurity while evoking the uncertainty of where these images were taken or if they are architectural plans. The images are non-traditional places because the majority of them are created from the artist’s own inventions (imagination), research and memories from industrial areas located mainly in Puerto Rico and other areas in the United States.

 

 “ I’m interested in the notion of security/insecurity produce by fictional images.  The fact is that I would like to achieve clear images, but at the same time a misinformation of what is happening in the picture; a mental gap between the images and its representation; a gap between what you observe and the message that it could produce”.  Gamaliel Rodríguez.

 

His recent solo exhibitions included as “Fallout”, at Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico (MAPR) San Juan, Puerto Rico (2013), Solo Projects-ARCO Madrid: Focus Latinoamerica at ARCO Feria Internacional de Arte Contemporáneo, Madrid Spain (2012), PINTA London 2010, Solo Project comissioned by Pablo León de la Barra at London Ingland (2010), The concepts of Fuel & Full at Galería Espacio Mínimo, Madrid, España (2009), SOLO Projects at CIRCA Puerto Rico'09, From my Position, Solo Show at Sandbekkstua arranged by Raelingen Arts Society (Raelingen Kunstforening) Raelingen, Norway (2007), among others.

His work is part of collections like:  MFA Museum of Fine Art Boston, Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico MAPR, Comunidad de Murcia. Murcia, Spain and has been featured in Modern Painters, Arte al Día, Art Nexus y Art Info. 

 

Gamaliel has received awards and participated in residencies like: Bronx Museum of Arts’Artist in Marketplace (AIM) Program (2014), International Studio & Curatorial Program (ISCP) NYC (2013), National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, MacDowell Colony. NH (2012), FUTURA Centre for Contemporary Art International Residency Program, Prague (2012),The Leon Levy Foundation Grant (2012), The MacDowell Fellowship (2012), Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant (2012),The UBS Prize, Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico (2011), The Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture Scholarship (2011). 

 

The exhibition LANDVIEW will be shown until October 14, 2014.