acrylic on canvas 36x24 in.
Penumbra and Parasite is a self portrait.
I'm pretty happy with how it came out and how all the elements are connected to one another. from a symbolic perspective the first character is the crouching woman (primitive in nature it relates to instincts) that turned into a cat or a soul being-i took a lot of inspiration from Leonora Carrington's traces between the ethereal and reality, and how her characters have human attributes, from a representational nature to convey messages of the beyond. she's unfinished and i decided to leave the canvas bare were her solar plexus is -referencing "the red studio" by Matisse. the hand is the touch of (god*) humanity reference to the creation, anatomically asymmetric, flesh toned (phallic) is both touching the creature, pointing to the right -referencing the tension between the abyss and human sexuality and what get's between the flesh is the instinct the soul and nature of both men and women. I've always played with the idea of the abyss staring at it and not being afraid of the unknown, her passive eyes look beyond the abyss in the middle's (vulva in nature) aperture for abstraction, an opportunity to ask questions or look further, it's shining enticing interaction. on the top right the 3 eyes mirror the crouching woman's eyes and there are 3 different sides/perceptions symbolizing abstract thoughts and how we tend to think we mirror ourselves seeing things from different perspectives. Lastly, Escobar's hippo is how this deconstruction and construction of composition started; he's emerging from the bottom of the canvas as a parasitic character; in Colombia long after Escobar died all his exotic animals were sold off or rescued to sanctuaries but the hippos stayed due to their violent nature they were unwanted, natives of Africa they made fertile Colombian soil their home.30 years later they became a parasite to the ecosystem , terrorizing both people and animals. I personally feel like a hippo, an awkward parasite, foreign, big, alienated, wild in both the US and Colombia. tied by blood or destiny all of these expressions relate to one another in a non linear fashion and they live amongst the horizon between the sea and sky.
