Stoa Gallery | STOA Gallery in Art Central Hong Kong 2024 with a dialogue between the urban landscapes of two Spanish artists, Conchi Alvarez and Miguel Angel Iglesias

26 Feb ART CENTRAL HONG KONG 2024

Posted at 11:56h in Art Fairs, Uncategorized by Stoa

ART CENTRAL HONG KONG 2024

27-31st of March

BOOTH
ARTISTS

For ART CENTRAL HONG KONG 2024 we propose a dialogue between the urban landscapes of two artists, Conchi Alvarez and Miguel Angel Iglesias. The success accomplished of this proposal, induces us to continue exhibiting the latest works on which these artists are working currently.

The urbs is a space that, ever since its first appearance way back in the Neolithic Era, led an extraordinary revolution that would change human life forever. The city, the quintessential social space, is where the dreams, longings, thoughts and reflections of these artists take place. And it is precisely in New York, in Manhattan, where our project makes the most sense.

Miguel Angel Iglesias and Conchi Alvarez reflect in their urban landscapes the plurality of views and perceptions that the city generates. Each of them has a particular approach to the city, despite sharing many elements. The most significant similarity is the absence of human beings. A curious coincidence, since urban zones, inhabited spaces par excellence, appear devoid of human presence on their canvases and panels.

Both creators have the spirit of the anchorite, needing solitude in order to create. And it is in the isolation of their studio that inspiration comes. In Conchi Alvarez´s case, it comes through the memory of spaces experienced, walked through, and then relived in a controlled daydream; whereas in Miguel Angel´s case, it derives through spaces flown over, to be subsequently explored and analysed. The cities are empty since this exercise of reliving, dreaming or scrutinizing the city, what it masks is a search to one´s inner self, as well as certain fear of socialisation.

For Conchi, this search has become a peripatetic exercise through her beloved cities. Said cities have been transformed into her own life itinerary because each glance at the city, is a mirror that reflects her own life back at her.

Miguel Angel’s quest is an almost mystical meditation that serves him as an instrument to get closer to people, to socialise. With a zenithal gaze, from a controlled flight, he turns and changes the angle of each new work, while he reflects on that ideal city in which its citizens will display an extraordinary coexistence.

Both reflect their state of mind in the use of colour. Conchi excavates through the grey and atonic walls of urban fixtures to discover, through light and colour, the essence of the city, unearthing its own soul. Miguel Angel develops perspectives where he models the buildings, this time in black and white. It is the melancholic gaze of the artist towards the city. Monochromes and grisailles in which he continues to channel his emotions, with more melancholy, with serene beauty.

From the emotional distance imposed by his study, both draw their ideal city, luminous, desirable… a colourful and luminous self-portrait of the soul, in the case of Conchi; sentimental, melancholic and nostalgic in the case of Miguel Angel.

The two side walls of the stand are the starting point for this urban project: acrylics by Miguel Angel that encourage us to fly over his ideal city, from the apparent contradiction between a desired socialization, and at the same time feared. Upon apprehending it, a process of changes begins in where the city becomes blurred, which helps us to land. And them the vision of the urbs changes to a close, friendly, colourful city, which is actually the personal and emotional self-portrait of the painter. The urban world of Conchi Alvarez invites us to walk in, live and enjoy her city.