COMING SOON: LEANDRO ERLICH BETWEEN PAINTINGS AND VIDEOTAPES
In the Ruth Benzacar Gallery, in Buenos Aires, the renowned Argentine artist Leandro Erlich (Buenos Aires, 1973) inaugurated Próximamente (Coming Soon). Known for its facilities that play with the perception of visitors, the exhibition that takes place in the gallery is a brief look at the past of Erlich, where it brings together a series of oils and elements that illustrate the formative process of his adolescence.
"The paintings in this exhibition are based on photographs of my installations," Erlich said. "They are, in fact, rather portraits of the creative process itself: the act of making something new, of telling a different story, of painting one thing over another."
For those who follow the career of the Argentine artist, a self-referential type exhibition is a novelty. The artworks of Erlich have always stood out for addressing issues of a political and universal nature (it is remembered when he "stole" the tip of the Obelisk, iconic monument of the City of Buenos Aires). However, Próximamente, as explained by the artist, emerged from another exhibition, the most ambitious he has developed in Latin America: "While I was preparing for LIMINAL - individual exhibition that will open on July 5 at the MALBA museum - I found myself thinking about adolescence and how it cultivated my inspiration". In this way, the show that is exhibited in Ruth Benzacar highlights the creative process of Erlich and the deposit of ideas that his adolescence means.
Transforming the gallery into what simulates a huge cinema hall with its respective billboards, Próximamente makes a tribute to cinema (a whole school for Erlich) and at the same time alludes to that which has not yet happened, that "latent, next, not yet fulfilled ", writes the artist. Rebuilding his youth, Leandro Erlich invokes in this exhibition his early cinephilia, where directors such as Allan Parker, Sam Peckinpah, Cóppola, Ethan and Joel Coen, and Antonioni constituted a creative imaginary. "It was a small place that promised and frustrated, a good corner to be alone but accompanied," he says in reference to the video stores he frequented in the 80s. "The covers anticipated stories that were revealed, then on the television. These images, like a poster, ignited the imagination and curiosity when trying to anticipate the stories ".
A little more than a week before LIMINAL opens at the Museum of Latin American Art in Buenos Aires (MALBA), Leandro Erlich's exhibition at Ruth Benzacar is presented as an opportunity to put all his artwork in dialogue with its formative process. The exhibition at MALBA, precisely, is an anthology of the most relevant works of Erlich from the 90s to the present, which for those who have visited Próximamente will be like observing the final result of an equation hardly formulated between paintings and videotapes.
In the Ruth Benzacar Gallery, in Buenos Aires, the renowned Argentine artist Leandro Erlich (Buenos Aires, 1973) inaugurated Próximamente (Coming Soon). Known for its facilities that play with the perception of visitors, the exhibition that takes place in the gallery is a brief look at the past of Erlich, where it brings together a series of oils and elements that illustrate the formative process of his adolescence.
"The paintings in this exhibition are based on photographs of my installations," Erlich said. "They are, in fact, rather portraits of the creative process itself: the act of making something new, of telling a different story, of painting one thing over another."
For those who follow the career of the Argentine artist, a self-referential type exhibition is a novelty. The artworks of Erlich have always stood out for addressing issues of a political and universal nature (it is remembered when he "stole" the tip of the Obelisk, iconic monument of the City of Buenos Aires). However, Próximamente, as explained by the artist, emerged from another exhibition, the most ambitious he has developed in Latin America: "While I was preparing for LIMINAL - individual exhibition that will open on July 5 at the MALBA museum - I found myself thinking about adolescence and how it cultivated my inspiration". In this way, the show that is exhibited in Ruth Benzacar highlights the creative process of Erlich and the deposit of ideas that his adolescence means.
Transforming the gallery into what simulates a huge cinema hall with its respective billboards, Próximamente makes a tribute to cinema (a whole school for Erlich) and at the same time alludes to that which has not yet happened, that "latent, next, not yet fulfilled ", writes the artist. Rebuilding his youth, Leandro Erlich invokes in this exhibition his early cinephilia, where directors such as Allan Parker, Sam Peckinpah, Cóppola, Ethan and Joel Coen, and Antonioni constituted a creative imaginary. "It was a small place that promised and frustrated, a good corner to be alone but accompanied," he says in reference to the video stores he frequented in the 80s. "The covers anticipated stories that were revealed, then on the television. These images, like a poster, ignited the imagination and curiosity when trying to anticipate the stories ".
A little more than a week before LIMINAL opens at the Museum of Latin American Art in Buenos Aires (MALBA), Leandro Erlich's exhibition at Ruth Benzacar is presented as an opportunity to put all his artwork in dialogue with its formative process. The exhibition at MALBA, precisely, is an anthology of the most relevant works of Erlich from the 90s to the present, which for those who have visited Próximamente will be like observing the final result of an equation hardly formulated between paintings and videotapes.
