Rafa Macarrón
19 Sep - 08 Nov 2013
RAFA MACARRÓN
19 September - 8 November 2013
“The human passions are a mystery, the same thing happens to children and to the elderly. All who are led by them cannot explain them, and those which have not lived them cannot understand them" (Michael Ende). The passion of Rafa Macarrón (Madrid, 1981) is to paint. To paint with the cold passion of who has been trained in professional cycling. As if he was aware that the Kingdom of Fantasy is in danger, as if each hour not dreamed -not painted - was a victory of emptiness.
Create unique characters. That is the challenge that Rafa Macarrón faces in the exhibition that Distrito 4 welcomes from September 19th 2013. Each character is unique because it embodies at the same time the universal and the unrepeatable, but also because each work calls out for all the attention. It cannot be diluted in the group. He has no other choice but to show himself. This circumstance requires that the artist increases the dramatization of his creatures, although the always present tenderness of the characters dims all the deformities of the soul.
The exhibition traces the experimental journey of Rafa Macarrón through different media. The paintings on canvas led him to trumpet the tables, three dimensions that play to become two, this time further artisan elaborated, in paper and cardboard, drawn with mixed technique. The game of perspective that started there, led him to create the boxes, also present. In its interior there is not a lamb, but a bright and intimate world. We cannot enter, but what we can do is look into his mystery world. The artist invites us to look at as the “Little Prince”, who encouraged Saint-Exupèry to retake his vocation of painter.
The next step has been sculpture. Macarrón completes the expansion of an inner world that increasingly invades our everyday and stays among us, allowing us greater interaction, inviting us to enter in his proposal of a mature innocence. Fantasy is not mere evasion: we are there to learn how to look at this world with new eyes. From there we are able to recognize how friendly the shadows of deformity are, the transcendent by coloring the everyday, the joy as a soundtrack of a simple life.
Among the pieces that are shown in the exhibition dogs come out to greet us. Alone or in herds, they are an obligatory reference to the artist. Its canine presence, the exaggerated humanity of the human characters breaks the solitude. Perhaps they accompany us, or perhaps they make us generous and we are the ones who accompany them. When they recognize us from afar they prepare a feast.
The man shaving, his largest sculpture is perhaps the deepest one, although its expressiveness invites us to an early smile. There are few simple actions such as daily shaving. Anodyne, intimate and lonely. But there are few actions as serious as looking into the mirror each morning: Who is this that looks like me? Who am I? For whom do I shave? Do I Want to live what is ahead of me and awaits me today? In this accustomed solitude each morning leads to an opening and presents the drama that connects us with the world. In this case, with two worlds: the everyday life and fantasy, which is present in a sculpture of three dimensions. Counting what hides in the mirror.
This journey from painting to sculpture is not progressive, but a spiral. His experimentation in a field bears fruit in the other. Macarrón reprises his paintings on canvas with renewed expressive force. There we find very, very unique characters. Some alone and some isolated in the immensity of the universe. The solitary Executive appears as locked in his own world where no one else can enter. He seems to require the visit of a little prince in search of a friend. His face, devoted to devour fast food, reveals a dark time and in need of tenderness. The character may not be unique. He could be a gray man, anonymous, like so many others. But this subtle demand for affection that Macarrón knows how to cause obliges us to love him, and love makes all things unique, as unique as the rose of asteroid B-612.
The triptych that entitles Godfather, Cebra and Señora also shows us characters in whose world no one else fits. They are alone, so alone that we no longer see them as deformed but as misshapen and failed. And yet, these characters are not crushed by the immensity of the sky. The depth of the cosmos does not override the irreducible mystery that contains each one. In spite of everything, the character is larger than the world and maintains its identity through his face.
The face of each character is the map of its soul. There are those who see the deformation of the figures of Macarrón as a battle with reality, some existential drama, that the deformations express of the Guernica or the nightmares of Dali. Perhaps we look not with the eyes of the artist, but with our own, that insist on pointing out how we should see things. Usually, the likenesses of the characters of Rafa indicate otherwise. The faces and the tones of each work invite us to feel tenderness, the enjoyment of actions and the vices of everyday, even to peace. This does not mean that the characters and the world are perfect. Nor that they do not express their inner drama. It means that, in spite of their deformation and their drama, they remain friendly. More in the wake of El Greco, the gaze through which the artist invites us is not condemnatory, but shaving.
When G. K. Chesterton prefaced a Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens he writes: "In beauty, perhaps, there is something linked to sadness; in the grotesque, even more, in what is rough, there is with total security and affirmation something akin to joy". Our time has been associated with too much simplicity, what is apollonian and static with happiness. Macarrón reveals to us the joy that comes from deformation and drama. This is the Franciscan joy who loves an imperfect world because it is the perfect footprint. There is no happiness because we are perfect; there is happiness when there is no pride.
The other unique characters escape, moreover, of the gravity signaled in the past. Or the world around them is less committed or in reality they are not alone, but with a dog. Just you and I, where the universe remains a mystery and the floor of life seems too narrow and not firm, however it collects that healthy fruit of the alliance between men and dogs.
The exhibition offers a multitude of small works, collage on wood and mixed media. In some we can admire just one character. Others are group portraits, family, perhaps gangs. Despite their smaller size, they contain the same dignity that the large-format. They are fruit of a sincere call to the existence of unique characters. He calls them to come out of the workshop, instead of being discarded or destroyed, it means that the artist has confirmed his life by saying: "I want you to always exist". They then receive a name, and with it the hope that they will find their own destiny.
A piece breaks the general tone of the exposure. The subtle irony of the artist is especially forceful. Rafa Macarrón makes us return to the beach, more cheerful and carefree. The work breaks the laws of perspective, and yet it works. He breaks the color rules and, even so, it works. He breaks his own rules for this job of placing single characters in large canvases and, even so, each of the countless characters of A la Playa is unique.
Álvaro Abellán-García
19 September - 8 November 2013
“The human passions are a mystery, the same thing happens to children and to the elderly. All who are led by them cannot explain them, and those which have not lived them cannot understand them" (Michael Ende). The passion of Rafa Macarrón (Madrid, 1981) is to paint. To paint with the cold passion of who has been trained in professional cycling. As if he was aware that the Kingdom of Fantasy is in danger, as if each hour not dreamed -not painted - was a victory of emptiness.
Create unique characters. That is the challenge that Rafa Macarrón faces in the exhibition that Distrito 4 welcomes from September 19th 2013. Each character is unique because it embodies at the same time the universal and the unrepeatable, but also because each work calls out for all the attention. It cannot be diluted in the group. He has no other choice but to show himself. This circumstance requires that the artist increases the dramatization of his creatures, although the always present tenderness of the characters dims all the deformities of the soul.
The exhibition traces the experimental journey of Rafa Macarrón through different media. The paintings on canvas led him to trumpet the tables, three dimensions that play to become two, this time further artisan elaborated, in paper and cardboard, drawn with mixed technique. The game of perspective that started there, led him to create the boxes, also present. In its interior there is not a lamb, but a bright and intimate world. We cannot enter, but what we can do is look into his mystery world. The artist invites us to look at as the “Little Prince”, who encouraged Saint-Exupèry to retake his vocation of painter.
The next step has been sculpture. Macarrón completes the expansion of an inner world that increasingly invades our everyday and stays among us, allowing us greater interaction, inviting us to enter in his proposal of a mature innocence. Fantasy is not mere evasion: we are there to learn how to look at this world with new eyes. From there we are able to recognize how friendly the shadows of deformity are, the transcendent by coloring the everyday, the joy as a soundtrack of a simple life.
Among the pieces that are shown in the exhibition dogs come out to greet us. Alone or in herds, they are an obligatory reference to the artist. Its canine presence, the exaggerated humanity of the human characters breaks the solitude. Perhaps they accompany us, or perhaps they make us generous and we are the ones who accompany them. When they recognize us from afar they prepare a feast.
The man shaving, his largest sculpture is perhaps the deepest one, although its expressiveness invites us to an early smile. There are few simple actions such as daily shaving. Anodyne, intimate and lonely. But there are few actions as serious as looking into the mirror each morning: Who is this that looks like me? Who am I? For whom do I shave? Do I Want to live what is ahead of me and awaits me today? In this accustomed solitude each morning leads to an opening and presents the drama that connects us with the world. In this case, with two worlds: the everyday life and fantasy, which is present in a sculpture of three dimensions. Counting what hides in the mirror.
This journey from painting to sculpture is not progressive, but a spiral. His experimentation in a field bears fruit in the other. Macarrón reprises his paintings on canvas with renewed expressive force. There we find very, very unique characters. Some alone and some isolated in the immensity of the universe. The solitary Executive appears as locked in his own world where no one else can enter. He seems to require the visit of a little prince in search of a friend. His face, devoted to devour fast food, reveals a dark time and in need of tenderness. The character may not be unique. He could be a gray man, anonymous, like so many others. But this subtle demand for affection that Macarrón knows how to cause obliges us to love him, and love makes all things unique, as unique as the rose of asteroid B-612.
The triptych that entitles Godfather, Cebra and Señora also shows us characters in whose world no one else fits. They are alone, so alone that we no longer see them as deformed but as misshapen and failed. And yet, these characters are not crushed by the immensity of the sky. The depth of the cosmos does not override the irreducible mystery that contains each one. In spite of everything, the character is larger than the world and maintains its identity through his face.
The face of each character is the map of its soul. There are those who see the deformation of the figures of Macarrón as a battle with reality, some existential drama, that the deformations express of the Guernica or the nightmares of Dali. Perhaps we look not with the eyes of the artist, but with our own, that insist on pointing out how we should see things. Usually, the likenesses of the characters of Rafa indicate otherwise. The faces and the tones of each work invite us to feel tenderness, the enjoyment of actions and the vices of everyday, even to peace. This does not mean that the characters and the world are perfect. Nor that they do not express their inner drama. It means that, in spite of their deformation and their drama, they remain friendly. More in the wake of El Greco, the gaze through which the artist invites us is not condemnatory, but shaving.
When G. K. Chesterton prefaced a Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens he writes: "In beauty, perhaps, there is something linked to sadness; in the grotesque, even more, in what is rough, there is with total security and affirmation something akin to joy". Our time has been associated with too much simplicity, what is apollonian and static with happiness. Macarrón reveals to us the joy that comes from deformation and drama. This is the Franciscan joy who loves an imperfect world because it is the perfect footprint. There is no happiness because we are perfect; there is happiness when there is no pride.
The other unique characters escape, moreover, of the gravity signaled in the past. Or the world around them is less committed or in reality they are not alone, but with a dog. Just you and I, where the universe remains a mystery and the floor of life seems too narrow and not firm, however it collects that healthy fruit of the alliance between men and dogs.
The exhibition offers a multitude of small works, collage on wood and mixed media. In some we can admire just one character. Others are group portraits, family, perhaps gangs. Despite their smaller size, they contain the same dignity that the large-format. They are fruit of a sincere call to the existence of unique characters. He calls them to come out of the workshop, instead of being discarded or destroyed, it means that the artist has confirmed his life by saying: "I want you to always exist". They then receive a name, and with it the hope that they will find their own destiny.
A piece breaks the general tone of the exposure. The subtle irony of the artist is especially forceful. Rafa Macarrón makes us return to the beach, more cheerful and carefree. The work breaks the laws of perspective, and yet it works. He breaks the color rules and, even so, it works. He breaks his own rules for this job of placing single characters in large canvases and, even so, each of the countless characters of A la Playa is unique.
Álvaro Abellán-García