ANGEL VERGARA

• Angel Vergara

This work by Angel Vergara is part of a series that was made for his solo exhibition at MACS Grand-Hornu in 2023 titles Dans l’instant. Conceptually, it is a continuation of a project he started in 2020 during the preparation of Manifesta 13 in Marseille. Here, Vergara worked with a group of visually impaired children. Together with them, he created paintings and drawings that became the canvases for different performances in the streets of Marseille and the painting series Les Belles Idées reçues. While the participatory element has always been present in his oeuvre, concrete workshops and collaborations would once again be a crucial component in the creation of this solo exhibition at MACS Grand-Hornu, this time with visually impaired children from Mons.

Painting is often considered a static art form. A completed canvas with dry paint departs an artist’s creative studio to be seen by the public. For Angel Vergara, the opposite is true. To paint is to act. It’s not a passive practice, it’s an active one. Throughout his long oeuvre, painting has been a form of constant interaction with visible and invisible forces. By bringing his canvases into the world-out of the studio’s confined, safe walls-he allows them to absorb the environment, continuously changing throughout.

Press release courtesy Axel Vervoodt Gallery