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Gallery Elena Shchukina, 22 September - 2 November 2016

The first-ever UK exhibition for cerebral Colombian abstractionist Mario Vélez


Gallery Elena Shchukina is delighted to announce Canto Rodado, an exhibition of painting, drawing, and sculpture by Mario Vélez, opening 22nd September 2016. 


With a field of reference that spans Colombian history from the pre-Columbian era through today, Mario Vélez interprets Latin American visual culture through the lens of abstract and expressionist art.  His work lies in the tradition of geometric abstraction pioneered by Kandinsky and Af Klint, but his idiosyncratic motifs and colour choices are inspired by the natural and built environments of Colombia.  He balances a cerebral focus on formal geometry with a playful, organic use of shape and colour.


Mario Vélez describes his artistic aim as being 'to reconnect, in some ways, to the primeval status of our culture - to embrace once more the essence of the past.'


Vélez revels in the tension between the rigid and the dynamic, using the coordinate grid as a starting point from which to investigate patterning and spatial relationships.  The unruly shapes in the foreground seem to break free from the lattice behind them to float inscrutably across the canvas, with some shapes clustering together while others hang alone. His geometric figures are characterised by an indeterminacy that draws from the enigmatic beauty of indigenous art. The textured ellipses that fill his work refer obscurely to the natural world, but they might equally denote seeds, boulders, or planetary arcs.   


Vélez builds on the paradigm established by early Latin American abstractionists such as Joaquín Torres García and Alfredo Hlito, who synthesised elements from indigenous and modernist art to create a new, post-colonial visual lexicon. His fusion of multiple artistic traditions reflects his belief in art's ability to transcend national, temporal, and linguistic barriers.


In Vélez's words, 'our common heritage is… a sensation that survives in ourselves, and is transmitted by the medium of painting'.  


In collaboration with Ministry of Nomads