Art Madrid'23 – COME TO DISCOVER WHAT THE EYE DOES NOT SEE

Eyes of a jumping-spider, magnified x10.
Javier Rupérez has specialised in images of insects, helping himself of led-lamps to throw light on his eight-leg models.

 

 

 

Technology has served science working on better telescopes, better microscopes, a lens of larger reach… from which an image is required as a result, a shot that finally captures that discovery, that unique moment. But without the need of crossing the edges of our planet, the world under microscope offers many of possibilities.

 

 

 

Igor Siwanowicz. Front foot (tarsus) of a male diving beetle, magnified x100.
5th place en el Small World Nikon, 2016.

 

 

 

The use of macro photography started to spread out into the biological research, but early it became clear the artistic potential it offered. At mid-path between research and photographic composition, some of these images seem unbelievable, or even we could think that they are whatever thing different from what they really are.

 

 

 

Alexey Kljatov inspired by his home country Russia to discover the beauty of a snowflake.

 

 

 

Macro photography works with images of small objects whose dimension must be seen at least at the same size they are. Many photography brands have focused on new objectives with lens specialised for this kind of works with outstanding results.

 

 

Suren Manvelyan.

 

 

Suren Manvelyan was a mathematics and astronomy teacher before devoting himself to photography. Now he works as a photographer for the Yerevan Magazine and he specialised in macro photography.

 

Some of the most impressive shots were taken by magnifying up to 30 times their size, what reveal an inaccessible reality to human eye, a universe of invisible details that even, taken out of context, lose the reference of their dimension and can look like monumental constructions.

 

 

 

Francis Sneyers, Scales of a butterfly wing underside (Vanessa atalanta), magnified x10.
11th place en el Small World Nikon, 2016.

 

 

Sharon Jhonstone is an English photographer that works artistic macro photography. The choice of motif, colour and light are not casual at all in the search for the perfect balance in her magnified compositions.

 

 

 

Sharon Jhonstone.

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.