ROBERTO GIL DE MONTES' BODIES AT KURIMANZUTTO

From 12/09/2023 to 12/22/2023
New York, Estados Unidos

The exhibition at Kurimanzutto Reverence in blue showcases surrealism-infused paintings by Roberto Gil de Montes exploring themes of belonging and perception, drawing from a rich tapestry of pre-Columbian and Huichol iconography, everyday life experiences, and contemporary art references.

ROBERTO GIL DE MONTES' BODIES AT KURIMANZUTTO

Gil de Montes underscores both fluidity and commonality among various perspectives and positionalities in conceiving the issue, an ethos of moving between categories—identity and artistic practice, to name only two—that would continue to inform his life and work.

 

While queerness has been a throughline in Gil de Montes’s work, it has only more recently been remarked upon as a longstanding facet of his paintings. The artist has long utilized the corporal—often, but not exclusively, the male body—as a contested site of fantasy, play, desire, and humor. This is on view in many of his new works: In Peculiarly Intimacy (2023), an ambiguously gendered couple, one partner in a jaguar bodysuit, lounge together in bed. In Wrecked (2023), a shirtless man reclines within the derelict remnants of a grounded boat, lost in revelry. In Catch (2023), two tan, fit young men pose together, holding a fish on the beach under a starry sky. The sky, the ocean, and the spaces between luxuriate in blue.

 

Eliding distinctions between memory and fantasy, Gil de Montes’s various invocations of memory, connection, and loss reverberate through the sumptuous details, delicate veils, and manifold blues of his recent paintings.

–David Evans Frantz.

Reverence in blue. Exhibition by Roberto Gil de Montes.

 

Until December 22, 2023.

 

Kurimanzutto. 516 w 20th street. New York, United States.