JOAQUIN TORRES-GARCIA:

My father recently came to know one of the board members at the Menil Museum here in Houston. (My father supports me a lot and tries to help me meet people that are involved in art around here) So we had lunch with him today and he gave us a personal walk through of the current exhibition,Joaquin Torres-Garcia: Constructing Abstraction with Wood. I had never heard of Joaquin T-G. but I think that somebody knew I was coming and sent me this show. The exhibit focused mostly on the artist's wood pieces, carvings, sculptures, superimposed paintings, and his wooden toys from the 1920s and 1930s. Although the imagery and textual content was different than mine, his overall aesthetic was quite similar to what I have been trying to achieve lately with wood.

I like his system of compartmentalizing everything in his composition. Everything seems to be there for a reason, and there is a lot of different stuff. Even his small wooden toys were very intuitive. He observed that his children were always interested in finding out how things function, so his toys disassemble in various ways. His carvings and wooden paintings were interesting in that they seemed to be telling the same story, a constantly projected vision of the world and how it should be, or maybe how it already is. He repeats a lot of symbols between works, namely anchors, clocks, fish, and religious symbols.

Garcia lived from 1874 to 1949. Although he was originally from Uruguay, he lived and worked in Italy, France, Spain, and New York. For more images and about the exhibit, click here.

Elsa Mora:

Elsa Mora is a Cuban born artist living and making work in Los Angeles, California. What drew me to her work was the intimate quality she infuses in her images and sculptures. Her characters and scenes are silent stories and faces, nameless creatures and women looking over their shoulders at you and drawing you in. There is a beautiful natural quality to her pieces, which she maintains through a variety of media. Interestingly, while she makes and sells prints of work, these intricate black and white designs begin as paper cutouts.

I enjoy the handmade look to her pieces as well. She makes use of many different craft materials to make things such as buttons, enamel cameos, porcelain, and paper sculptures which she often incorporates in installations and collages. To me, Elsa Mora's approach of combining human and natural (plant and animal) imagery, such as bees and dragonflies, takes advantage of the inherent symbolism and narrative quality in nature, and comments on the human experience. Her arrangements deal with communities and relationships, memories and experiences.
I particularly like this piece from a 2001 exhibition entitled MUTE. She used handmade porcelain objects that represented an accumulation of her silence about past traumas and experiences in her life. Her presentation consisted of massive photographs of the objects interacting with her body and overlooking a table displaying the porcelain objects themselves, which I thought communicated her personal story very clearly and intimately.

More Images.