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Latest Artist's Video:
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Artist Statement:
When you work in differents
diciplines in art it´s hard to
exempt the temptation of
connect them, I NEED to work
with text, visual and music at
the same time with the same
issue.
I read practically all the
time since I was 4 years old.
I immediately “devoured” ...
Further Information
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Artist Exhibitions:
ACTUAL PROJECTS
•Personal Show, "Engano
colorido", at galeria de la
cuidad de tecate, until
december 2009
VISUAL ARTS
INDIVIDUAL EXHIBITIONS -
Selection –
2006 “Requiem para un
trotamundos – 86 años de
viaje” (“Requiem for a
globetrotter – an 86 year
journey”), Antichi Forni
Gallery, Macerata, Italy
“Un deseo de formas y lí...
Further Information
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Collections:
National Academy of Graphic
Arts, Russia
DIN A4 Collection,
Holland-Germany
Museum of Contemporary Art,
Cuenca, Ecuador
Watercolor Museum, Estado de
Mexico
Cultural Institution of Baja
California
Also in numerous private
collections throughout Baja
California, California, USA,
Spain and Mexico City
...
Further Information
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Commissions:
Coming Soon!
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Reviews for Laura Castanedo:
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MATERIA DE SUEÑOS
En medio de un paisaje árido, agreste, que desde hace años emite señales sobre el calentamiento global en el norte de Baja California, la artista Laura Castanedo parece protegerse de ese difícil entorno mediante obras de intenso cromatismo y jugosa materia pictórica, destinadas también a mostrar la vitalidad creadora que la naturaleza humana es capaz de generar en cualquier circunstancia.
Su imaginación es ahora --como en ocasiones anteriores si hurgamos en una trayectoria individual compleja y diversa-- fruto visible del automatismo propio de las primeras vanguardias del siglo xx y de un movimiento tan vigoroso como fue el surrealismo, cuando un notable grupo de artistas descubrió las verdades ocultas en los sueños al calor de las investigaciones de Sigmund Freud. Sin un plan predeterminado, la artista se asoma al lienzo blanco para descargar toda su pasión y energía bajo los dictados del gesto informal, del fluir de sensaciones que no cesan hasta concluir una obra pletórica de líneas y manchas, de formas que nos recuerdan otras provenientes de organismos microscópicos o del inmenso espectro vegetal que nos rodea.
Por momentos sentimos en esas pinturas de mediano y gran formato el influjo de la candorosa abstracción de Joan Miró, en otros la locura fantasmagórica de Roberto Matta pero mucho más matéricas ya que nos asalta el deseo de tocarlas para sentir el espeso contenido de texturas, la pastosidad de un brillo metálico que nos conmueve.
Detrás de esos conglomerados visuales de Laura que nos recuerdan el universo pictórico de los niños y las niñas, se manifiesta un sentido espacial inequívoco, un dominio de las formas y las transiciones entre ellas, además de una exploración racional de colores que elude facilismos y gratuidades sin sentido. Por ello estas pinturas acumulan significados diversos, lo que las convierte en universos abiertos y cerrados a la vez, en los que cabe, si es necesario, un texto, un elemento tridimensional.
Objetos artísticos de gozosa visualidad para festejar los sentidos del ojo humano son estas obras que estimulan la dulce sensación de ver más, y más y más, como profundo homenaje a la inagotable capacidad retiniana del ser.
Nelson Herrera Ysla
La Habana, octubre y 2009
Requiem for a globetrotter – an 86 year journey
What is Life? Can an artist have the answer to this question?
How does he find in his own life the way to satisfy this curiosity?
Is it a curiosity? Is it not a necessity?
Many questions; all together they form a story that the artist must write, draw, paint. In two words: he must live them too.
And what if the life we talk about is the life of her Grandfather?
And what if the artist is the granddaughter who has lived with him until the last moment; the most important part of his own life?
In this case she has the obligation to tell it, to tell it to everyone because she knows more than anyone about this man, who is not "a" man but "the" man.
Tell it girl, tell it. Through your tears, through your smile. Through the scent of life and the eau de cologne, of life and the sea, of life and the things he has left you. The things he has left you along with the stories he has tell you, living them again and again with you.
So the images take form, so the story takes form, therefore something new is found that is really the same as yesterday only that in a new and transformed way.
This is the artist: a transformer of everything that he has lived in something new in appearance, which is enough so that the others can deeply live and feel the wonderful fragrance of what the artist wants to share with them.
Now, carefully, we go into Laura’s images because it is possible, in every way it is possible to penetrate the images she gives us, without shame for her tears and for everything she has been through to create them.
Step by step we discover our own emotions just as we never felt them before, us who, in the first place, thought we would discover her emotions opened through this long journey of 86 years.
A t-shirt, a flower, the bones, everything mixes up and takes a different shape.
The eyes of what sees make the difference.
My eyes discover my life’s emotions joining Laura’s emotions, and all that deep exchange is done through, enchantment of living, the life of a man who, without ever knowing him, is teaching me something very important: that the key that opens the door to mystery is made of love, it is built with strength and what we live in this key nobody can steal or destroy it. It remains in our life for ever and if we have had the fortune of living it we have the obligation to transmit it.
Thus the circle of this journey through Laura’s work closes. Without beginning or end.
What has been is still is at this moment and will be for ever.
Thank you, with all my heart, for this wonderful experience.
Thank you Laura, with all my heart, for your courage.
Thank you.
Alfonso Caputo
Google Earth – Mexico – Tecate – Art
Maria Felix, the great international film star of Mexican origin, who became co owner of Mexico Subway Corporation, had a house built for herself in Tecate on the property of then President Aleman. There was even an airport on that property until after WW II; then it became a drag race track and now it’s being slotted for housing development. The Maria Felix house has a grand stairway that not only would have provided Maria Felix a great setting for her descending to greet the public, but it would certainly have been worth a re-enactment of a descent of Josephine Baker. Even Marlene Dietrich would have appreciated the moment of glory of being able to come down those stairs. Now, these stairs are the venue for another artist, mother of a university student and a teenage daughter who have to share her with her husband as well as many other passions. As a mother she is worth over US$ 500,000.
But as an artist, she is worth many times that. Her enviable energy is expressed in her art in many forms. I only can narrate a few of those,since I only know of some of her artistic endeavours and certainly am missing some other aspects of her art.
Before that let me refer to the elements of my title above. Google
Earth is now one of her preferred pastimes, and she has pins on
relevant locations on the globe. Tecate, of course, is the navel of
the world with good reason – not only is she here in Maria Felix's
house, but there is a large number of soul mates of the arts, not only painting, but ceramics, piano, guitar, song and theatre. Then there is a pin on Monterrey where her university student son has some
complaints. To his father, he complains that his grades are not very
good … because his 24 hour day is not long enough. He has learned that partying and success in exams are inversely proportional – more
partying, lesser acceptable results in exams. To his mother, he
complains that the food is lousy and that he would like for his
birthday gift some cash to be able to go and have a good T-bone steak.
Then there is another pin on Arad, where our artist has exhibited for
several years and in 2005 was member of the Committee of the
Contemporary Art Biennial that competes with Documenta and Venice. Then there is a pin on Hong Kong where a time capsule was
buried this year containing the artistic contribution by Laura. Of
course, Paris cannot be ignored by any artist, and Google Earth
permits Laura to see the Eiffel tower not only from above, but from
any of its sides and how to get from there to Montmartre, the age-old
artistic enclave. She also visits on Google Earth Germany, the
Netherlands, Spain and all of Europe where her art is travelling in a
collective exhibition, in the hope that she will sell and replace some of her contributions. St. Petersburg was in 2004, and New York another 2005 event. Now, in October 2005, there are two simultaneous exhibits – yes, in Havana. This is what we call a global artist.
Now to the other word in the title above: Laura is Mexico in her
Freudian subconscious and in her paintings. One of her latest series
is an allegory on Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, a nun that under the
Spanish domination of Mexico expressed Mexican mores at the highest
level. No one could visit New Spain in the seventeenth century without paying respects to Sor Juana. As a nun she exercised more power than the envoys of the Spanish king. To get a fascinating insight into this period and its historical development, read Octavio Paz´s book on Sor Juana. Laura's series consists of 20 expressions; she thinks that 12 are too little and 24 too much, but of course there are the paintings that lead up to the series and there are paintings that form the transition to the next series, but still heavily influenced by the previous one. Laura experiments with many materials, collages, tones,colours and paints. Now, the prevalent one is acrylic and either blue or red dominate the individual canvas.
The third element of the title above: Tecate, on October 12, 2005, turned 113 years old. It may be better known as a brand of beer, but let's be clear on that: yes, that beer is brewed here, but it was only started in the 1940s by German brewers. Now it is one of the two big Mexican brewery groups that dominate the country's beer market. Tecate also has a building that is from the Frank Lloyd Wright school of architecture: its Railroad station! But Tecate is not only that. It is one of the few legal doors between Mexico and the United States. Anyone who thinks that Tecate is a culturally mixed environment has not visited the Diana, a very local institution on the main square of the town. Laura has for years been co-organizer of cultural events in Tecate that have brought artists from all over. It is also the place where her teenage daughter has to what she perceives as suffer through her schooling. At present, she likes some subjects and dislikes others. Shortly, in the future, she will dislike any kind of control. She is on her best way to practice her mother's many inherited talents and will be as generous as her mother towards other artists and to other people.
Finally, our last topic of the title- Art-, and here we would like to
talk about the many artistic expressions of Laura Castanedo. As
portrayed above, she is an accomplished painter, but Laura is much
more. She has the musical skills of a concert pianist; she is an
artist that can see through the photographic lenses pictures that
provide food for thought. She is a sculptor who caresses the wood to
express herself. She is a movie actress who right now is being shown
in the festival of Latin American cinema in New York. She does theatre and you have never felt the famous poem "Platero y yo" if you have not heard her recital with guitar background. She also has a CD recital of poems by Garcia Lorca, accompanied by guitarist Alberto Ubach. As well as various other C Ds- all sold out at the present time.
The artist Laura finds art in the day-to-day events.
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