Art Madrid'23 – 3 Punts Galery in Art Madrid15

It is called Thierry Guetta and was born in Paris in 1966 but everyone knows him as Mr. Brainwash, one of the most important artists of contemporary urban art. In 2014 he exhibited for the first time in Spain with the Gallery 3 Punts (Barcelona) and he will be on February at the 10th anniversary edition of the fair Art Madrid.

 

Life is Beautiful. Mr. Brainwash.

3Punts Gallery works for almost 20 years in the promotion of contemporary art in its various forms. Directed by Javier López and Eduard Duran, pays special attention to the work of new artists, no forgetting established career artists. In 2014 he made a great signing, the acclaimed street artist Mr. Brainwash.

 
With his hat and settled behind his camera, the French immigrant Thierry Guetta started collecting images about was what happening on the streets of Los Angeles, more specifically in its walls. They were the 90s of last century and graffiti flooded the cities. Obey, Space Invader and Banksy appeared in the media for their critical messages, its appropriation, its literal invasion of public space ... and, soon after, his arrival to the galleries, museums, and art criticism.

Tomato Spray. Mr. Brainwash.

 

Loving urban art, Guetta joined Shepard Fiery and traveled the world recording their stencils and wall paintings, his works and those of all urban artists who they crossed with... and so met Banksy, an essential influence who encouraged him to take another step, leaving the camera and creating his own signature: Mr. Brainwash was born.
 
With stickers, stencils and modifying and creating serial works already produced by others, Mr. Brainwash employs 25 assistants for help to "customize" great art that he scans, copy and paste with his style created to "wash the brain. He made a mega exhibition in 2008, Life is Beautiful, with a relentless communication strategy: a phrase from his friend Banksy: "Mr. Brainwash is a force of nature, is a phenomenon and I'm not saying in a good way. "
 
Media focused on L.A. and Mr.Brainwash, Madonna entrusts him the cover of his album Celebration in 2009 and in 2010 will end up being the protagonist of the documentary Exit trough the gift shop, made from footage recorded by Guetta and edited by Banksy. The movie got an Oscar nomination.

 

Mona Linesa. Mr. Brainwash.

 

Soon they come multitudinous exhibitions as Icons, Under Construction,... Mr. Brainwash exhibited in New York, Miami, Toronto, at the Olympic Games in London, Cape Town ... His work came to Spain, for the first time in November with 3 Punts Gallery in Barcelona and it also comes to Art Madrid 15 next February. 3Punts proposal brings his most representative works, with their POP stamp, silkscreen on canvas, cardboard and paper, icons of contemporary culture passed through the washing-brain of this graffiti artist.
 

Besides the works of Mr. Brainwash, 3 Punts Gallery brings Blek Le Rat, Efraïm Rodríguez, Gerard Mas, Ramón Surinyac, Samuel Salcedo y Sito Mújica.

 
David. Blek Le Rat.

 

In the year 2020 in the heart of Barcelona a wandering gallery was born, the same one that in February 2021 would debut at Art Madrid with an exhibition proposal focused on contemporary portraits; with this subject matter it would manage to create a powerful dialogue between artwork and audience and make the seal Inéditad remain in the history of the event that contained it.

Jean Carlos Puerto. Protección. Oil and copper leaf on wood. 60 x 48. 2021. Image courtesy of the gallery.

Since that first time and until today, the wandering gallery has managed to build projects on otherness, has repositioned in the spotlight the discourses on the LGTBIQ+ collective, has consolidated a group of artists who share its principles of resilience and empathy and the best thing is that it continues to bet from the professionalism and commitment to give voice to the difference.

Claudio Petit-Laurent.. El Joven de la Perla. Oil on wood. 30 x 30 cm. 2023. Image courtesy of the gallery.

Inéditad Gallery, thanks to its founder Luis López, its collaborators and the infinite possibilities manifested in the works of the artists it represents, is a gallery that has demonstrated its capacity and courage to stimulate the sensibility of the public through art and seduce a generation that moves between the glass window and the analogical story. Inéditad is a nomadic gallery that has gathered around it a community of artists and has moved the context with exhibition projects that think about LGTBIQ+ art without prejudices.

Pepa Salas Vilar. Las marcas del arcoiris. Oil on canvas. 40 x 50 cm. 2022. Image courtesy of the gallery.

Pride and Prejudice was inaugurated. An exhibition that brings together the works of sixteen artists: Abel Carrillo, Alex Domènech, Carlos Enfedaque, Silvia Flechoso, Jamalajama, Daniel Jaén, Claudio Petit-Laurent, Jean Carlos Puerto, Fernando Romero, Pablo Rodríguez, Pepa Salas Vilar, Jack Smith, Pablo Sola, Bran Sólo, Elia Tomás and Utürüo. Painting, illustration, photography and digital art are the manifestations that bring into dialogue around fifty neatly threaded pieces, in a discursive line that discusses such a latent phenomenon as discrimination. To achieve this, the artists invited to the exhibition question themselves whether: Does discrimination exist within the LGTBIQ+ collective?

Pride and Prejudice Official Poster. Image courtesy of the gallery.

With approaches on and from the body, the proposal invites to celebrate diversity, proposes to question and self-question the prejudices and attitudes of society against the collective. Pride and Prejudice is a space for dialogue about the constructs imposed on us by society. It is also an oasis in which to deconstruct with tolerance and respect the subjectivities that sometimes prevent us from approaching the production of the participating artists, simply because "the beautiful" does not fit in an androgynous body. The subjugation of stereotypes are pressed with determination to find the beauty of diversity in other palpable facets of reality.

Pablo Sola. All men are dogs. Photography. 2014. Image courtesy of the gallery.

Throughout these three years Inéditad has stimulated the vindictive projection towards bad practices, has questioned estates around the LGTBIQ+ body and the most admirable thing, is that these capacities have resurfaced around the dialogue and the visual narrative of the stories that are told from the visual: Artworks that are people, art that is, per se, humanity. Overcome impositions and accept what is different in order to continue fighting against homophobia, biphobia, lesbophobia or transphobia and defend the equal rights that all the acronyms of the collective deserve in our community.

That's Pride and Prejudice: One creature, the happiest in the world. And maybe other projects and other people have said it - or felt it - before, but none so fairly.

Silvia Flechoso. Hola, soy maricón. Oil on canvas. 73 x 54 cm. 2023. Image courtesy of the gallery.

From June 8th until June 22nd you can visit Pride and Prejudice. Carrer de Palau núm. 4. Canal Gallery space. Barcelona.