By Nathan Duke
Queensborough Community College will explore the contrast of reality vs. perception for the next three months as the school’s art gallery hosts an exhibit featuring the work of Spanish installation artist Quintana Martelo.
“Memoria,” an exhibit first shown at the Church of the University of Santiago de Compostela, will be on display at Queensborough’s art gallery from Nov. 21 through Feb. 12.
Faustino Quintanilla, executive director and curator of the college’s gallery, said installation art exhibits are unique because they are designed specifically for the spaces in which they are installed.
“Because of its modern, immediate sensibility — and Mr. Martelo’s masterful presentation of its concepts — installation art is very appealing to young people and I anticipate that our students will especially enjoy this particular show,” Quintanilla said.
Martelo was born in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, in 1949 and moved to Barcelona to first study calligraphic printmaking at the Escuela Superior de Bellas Artes and then contemporary mural painting at Pintura Mural, Sant Cugat de Valles.
The artist, who has been exhibiting his work for 39 years, focuses on the question of reality and perception in “Memoria.” The work includes replicas of the artist’s bedroom and bathroom, which represent his interpretation of space as places of power, love, affliction and intimacy, Martelo said.
One of the paintings is a bed strewn with pillows over which hangs a photo of the same bed, while another work is an installation of a life-size wooden table with a self-portrait sculpture of a man made of polyester resin who is standing next to a chair and staring at a large painting of an upside-down artist and his studio.
“The reason and the intention of painting and, from my point of view, the last interest lies in the recognition of changes, the mistakes or corrections configuring the act of painting, in managing to achieve an order, a harmony or open beauty out of the referent standard; moving in time, turning the space into an obsession and not into a conquest, constantly spinning around myself just trying to understand,” Martelo said.
Reach reporter Nathan Duke by e-mail at nduke@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-229-0300, Ext. 156.
