Design work for the studio, geometric posters
“My professional career is as a graphic designer, but photography is a special, unique way to control and mitigate my bipolar condition. It is my personal treatment and many of my works are deeply influenced by my changing and contradicting mood states. But it was the discovery of the alternative photographic processes and the influence of Omaira Abadia that defined, and refined my approach to photographic art.
As a Colombian visual artist and designer my work is focused in finding artistic pathways to meld indigenous cultural roots with a global worldwide vision. Currently my goal is to experiment with mixtures between classical (analogical) and digital techniques of representation, capture and printing of images; trying to find a personal way to express my vision and feelings on subjects. My main theme is the city: it landscape, it struggles, it stigmas, it inhabitants, its outsiders. The city as an extension of greater humanity and its relationships. I live in a city which is a mixture of so many elements and factors, a destination for thousands of people running from 40 years of warfare, a place to live, learn, dream and suffer. A city destroyed and rebuilt, full of people giving the best to build and rebuild their own dreams and lives. But above all, a city full of hope and hard work. In my own work I try to reflect my concerns about my role like a man and an artist in a process between traditions and preconceptions, and more post-modern perceptions about myself, my sexuality, my place and my future. Between traditions, rituals, history tempered by (nihilist urges and hedonistic streaks) I try to find equilibrium.
As it is for many of my work is cathartic and a declaration of pride about my condition; my art pieces try to talk about my country, our wars, our pain, our dreams, our cultural melting pot and our never ending search for meaning. The other ever-present theme in my work is the concept of role as a cultural creation which has little relationship to human beings and is the fruit of powers in some specific space and time. I don’t believe I create photographs, instead I think I build images using photographic medium and techniques as a part of the process of giving material sensate structure to concepts and ideas. I deeply admire artists able to capture meaningful instants allowing them to stand in time. But as a creator, I see myself more like an artisan, like a designer who plays with ideas, thoughts, cultural values and pressures; who attempts to balance tensions, tones, shapes in the pursuit of visual pieces that are imagistic in their deepest nature, but beyond the act of capture alone.”