antonio santin art blog

ART HONG KONG SOLO SHOW

2011-05-19T04:06:00.000-07:00

WILDE Gallery Berlin

WILDE Gallery is pleased to announce our participation in
Art Hong Kong with a solo presentation of new paintings by Antonio Santín

2010-08-12T07:58:00.000-07:00

APPROACHING THE ONION

from Antonio Santín

September 3 – October 9, 2010

Vernissage: September 3rd from 19h (7pm)

WILDE Gallery is pleased to announce Approaching the Onion, the first solo exhibition of Spanish painter Antonio Santín with the gallery.

Antonio Santín paints scenes of existential ennui, women depicted in domestic yet surreal environments cluttered with material objects. Santín, who specialized in sculpture during his studies, carves forms out of the layers upon layers of paint that he applies, arriving at densely structured yet luminescent compositions. The subjects that Santín selects for his large-scale paintings are primarily young women, who confront the viewer with a stoic gaze, almost morose in its serenity and yet silently defiant, inquisitive and unforgiving.

Santín is a draftsman of exceptional skill. Deriving inspiration from Spanish masters such as Velázquez, Goya and Greco, Santín renders his subjects with precise detail and controlled painterly flourishes. His brushstrokes take on a three dimensional treatment, reducing the paint to graduated matter that is carved away to excavate the inner being of the subject. Santín’s paintings are replete with poetic distractions: the artist’s use of pattern, baroque arrangements of his interiors’ décor, and his attention to the dramatic interplay of light and shadow afford his compositions an almost cinematic aesthetic. The pale radiance of his figures’ complexions set against the chaos of their backgrounds achieves a theatrical quality, a scene staged by the artist.

By photographing his models in their own habitats, with carefully orchestrated lighting and props chosen from the models’ possessions, Santín’s source material is very much his own creation, despite being comprised of found objects belonging to his subject. The artist considers these paintings to be still lives more so than portraits and instructs his models to become “just another object in the room.” These photo sessions are acts of intimacy, in which the artist enters the model’s studio instead of the other way around. Ultimately, the interiors Santín depicts can be interpreted as both private domestic spaces and psychological landscapes.

In his articulation of the subject, the models’ clothing takes on a metaphorical significance. Ornate in their abstraction, these dresses are exquisite chrysalides, cocoon-like encasings that protect the wearer during their transition from one state of being to another. As in ancient depictions of the Greek God Thanatos, Santín’s references to the pupa and butterfly convey allusions to the soul and to the psyches of his subjects. Their facial expressions, at once placid yet bellicose, seductive yet indifferent, signify the duality of eros and thanatos.

By rendering these isolated figures, as vulnerable as they are provocative, Santín’s paintings embody Jean Paul Sartre’s existential statement that “God is the solitude of man.”

Antonio Santín was born in Madrid, Spain in 1978. He has exhibited internationally and is represented in the collection of the French Ministry of Culture, among numerous private collections worldwide. He was an artist in residence at Kunstlerhaus Glogauer in Berlin, as well as at Centre dárt Contemporani Piramidon in Barcelona. The artist currently lives and works in Berlin.

image at top:
Antonio Santín, Schönleinstraße, 2010
Oil on canvas, 240 x 180 cm

FILE ISSUE 3

2010-04-05T14:23:00.000-07:00

FILE Magazine is a bi-annual publication featuring a broad selection of visual communication in the fields of graphic design, art, photography, fashion and moving image. Beautifully presented in a 30 x 39 cm hard cover with a full colour 52 gsm newsprint stitched inside. Each issue is accompanied by a DVD featuring short films, music videos and documentaries. A magazine to Watch & Read.

http://file-magazine.com/magazine/file-issue-3-pre-order

SCOPE New York - WILDE Gallery

2010-02-26T09:22:00.000-08:00

2009-09-15T14:12:00.000-07:00

Tape Modern is pleased to announce our biggest event to date:

Earthly Delights a group exhibition Opening, Friday September 25th and a big after party for the art fair weekend.

Earthly Delights, Tape Modern No.11

Curated by Anna Erickson

In cooperation with Heidestrasse galleries and Halle am Wasser

Opening: Friday September 25th 6pm-3am
Exhibition duration: Saturday September 26th and Sunday September 27th 11am-6pm.
Location: TAPE, Heidestrasse 14. 10557 BERLIN S-BHF

Featuring the work of 13 artists, Earthly Delights takes its name from Hieronymus Bosch’s iconic painting from 1503, The Garden of Earthly Delights, which depicts across three panels God presenting his creation of Adam and Eve, a bacchanal orgy of humans, hybrid creatures and otherworldly animals and, finally, a hellscape in which eternal suffering and damnation are portrayed in terrifying scenes of torture
and anguish. Considered by many to represent a sequential narrative of mankind’s initial state of purity in Eden, subsequent corruption and ultimate punishment in Hell, Bosch’s work builds on symbolic systems that reference alchemy, astrology, heresy and the recesses of the human psyche to form a complex pantheon of desire and depravity that is consistently acclaimed as one of the most significant artistic
achievements ever created. The painting is viewed as a moral warning against lust and worldly pleasure and has been described as "an erotic derangement that turns us all into voyeurs."

The work presented in Earthly Delights is a contemporary interpretation of the prevailing themes encompassed by Bosch’s masterpiece. The Berlin-based artist duo Awst & Walther invoke original sin with their piece Temptation, while Hannes Bend’s
life-size candy sculpture, a composite of both male and female anatomy, references the hybrid forms rendered in Bosch’s central panel. Torsten Solin’s absurd dream-like landscapes are both sexually provocative and utterly grotesque, while Vincent Wenzel presents Freakfries, a masterpiece large-scale painting depicting the chaos of
the subconscious. John Miserendino creates a modern day and abstracted version of The Triumph of Death from 1562 by Peter Brueghel the Elder which resides in the Prado Museum directly across from The Garden of Earthly Delights. Angela Liosi creates tiny diorama scenes of violence and murder and Antonio Santin and Sophie Reinhold portray the darker side of humanity in their paintings. Kenno Apatrida will produce a performance specifically for the exhibition during the opening on Friday September 25 using death masks and the nude female body in a bacchanalia tribute to Hieronymus Bosch.

The main hall of Tape will be specially transformed into an exhibition space and burlesque club with a bar. In addition to the exhibition there will be a separate party in the club starting at 11pm.

Earthly Delights will feature work from the following artists; Kenno Apatrida , Awst & Walther, Hannes Bend, Amir Fattal, Nir Hod, Filippos Kavakas, Angela Liosi, John Miserendino, Cornelia Renz, Sophie Reinhold, Antonio Santin, Torsten Solin, and Vincent Wenzel.

The exhibition is curated by Anna Erickson, private art dealer living and working in Berlin and New York, former sales director for Gagosian Gallery, New York and former Director of Yvon Lambert, New York. Erickson has a BA in Art History and MA in Art Administration.

2009-08-27T03:40:00.000-07:00

WILDE Gallery

INVENTORY # 2

July 25 - September 5

Finissage on September 5th at 19h (7pm)

Chausseestrasse 7

10115 Berlin

+49 (0)30 258 16 258

Tue. - Sat 12 - 18 (or by appointment)

www.wilde-gallery.com

_____________________________________

Held once a year, the INVENTORY # project becomes the file under which WILDE Gallery mounts investigative displays of its gallery artists.

For the second installment of INVENTORY #, Wilde Gallery will introduce a guest artist among it's community of gallery artists. This year we present the work of Spanish painter Antonio Santín.

"Spanish born Antonio Santín is the guest artist of INVENTORY#2 for 2009. Although the artists' painterly approach is traditional, his subjects are photo based and at times evoke a digital camera rendering, which brings to his pictures a proof of the struggles with contemporary subjectivity and the challenges of defining meaning where there might only be superficiality. Santín's paintings are sculptural, which is evident in the ways that the brushstrokes take on a three dimensional treatment, reducing the paint to graduated matter that is carved away to excavate the inner being of the subject".

2009-06-06T08:25:00.000-07:00

ROLLO Contemporary Art, 51 Cleveland steret, London W1T 4JH

THE INFLUENCE OF PHOTOGRAPHY IN PAINTING

3rd June - 10th July 2009

http://www.rolloart.com/

ROLLO Contemporary Art presents a group exhibition of international painters whose works display a relationship to the photographic medium. The works by these artists remain inherently 'painterly'; displaying confident application of paint and visibly bold brushstrokes, yet in a variety of ways these paintings create a dialogue with photographic practice and place painting within a larger context of imagery.

Artists

Tiina Heiska (b.1959. Finnish, lives and works in Finland)

Andrew Hollis (b. 1974 South African, lives and works in U.K.)

Antonio Santin (b. 1978 Spanish, lives and works in Germany)

"Santin's larger than life paintings of women's faces seem reminiscent of cosmetic advertising campaigns, where attractive faces are exclusively focused upon and isolated against stark non-descript backgrounds.

The starting point of Santin's painting process is indeed to photograph models in his studio. However, when translating these photographs into paint, Santin disturbs his sugary sweet images by applying abstract gestures of paint over the surface of the photo-realist painted faces, obscuring the original image and immediately changing its intentions.

Santin's images are imbued with a provocative edge, a painterly violation of photographic intentions - whilst simultaneously suggesting a celebration of the freedom of paint, enlivening an image from the flatness and fixed, controlled nature of the photographic image.

In Santin's work, paint dominates over photography to suggest the artist has ultimate control to manipulate and revel in the freedom of making" (ROLLO press release)

2009-04-11T06:13:00.000-07:00

2009-02-24T03:25:00.000-08:00

ARTMADRID 09 GALERIA RITA CASTELLOTE

2009-01-15T08:05:00.000-08:00

Modart TV: 5 Year Heliumcowboy from Modart Magazine on Vimeo.

Modart TV nterview with Jörg Heikhaus (auf deutsch)

We've been celebrating 5 years heliumcowboy artspace with a big group exhibition in July-August, featuring:
56k, Akane Kimbara, Alex Diamond, Alexey Mirni, Antonio Santin, Blami, Boris Hoppek, Casey McKee, Christophe Lambert, Jim Avignon, Jon Burgerman, Kingdrips, Karen Koltermann, Ki Yoon Ko, Lena Schmidt, Luiza Mogosanu, Lui Roq, Mike Swaney, moki, Stephen Smith/Neasden Control Centre, Nina Braun, Pandarosa, Patrick Farzar, Rinzen, Thomas Markus Schumann, Victor Castillo, Rai Escale, 4000, and more.

2008-12-19T08:10:00.000-08:00

Interview by Tom de Freston with Antonio Santin.

http://www.whalecrow.co.uk/whalec/2008/12/18/interview-by-tom-de-freston-with-antonio-santin/

Tom de Freston(Tdf):
De Kooning said: ‘Flesh was the reason oil paint was created’. What correlation do you see between flesh and paint?

Antonio Santin (AS):
It’s always fascinating the second in which we manage to doubt, suddenly seeing blood all over the brush, life on a canvas, weights inside colors…. Nothing is more addictive than setting traps for oneself, and succeeding in it. In my latest works I explore the limits of the dichotomy meat/flesh, and consequently those between hunger and desire. In my native language Spanish, both terms are included in the very same word, “carne”, this semantic indistinction sums up somehow the tacit reflection in my work. Partially my intention, by choosing either a human head or a carcass is the analysis and reconstruction of its volume, as a soul vessel, containing a feeling or its lack. The way the oil layers settle, following the natural structures of meat and fat from the inside to the skin, is a testament to this analytic structural approach.

Tdf: Who and why would you cite as your key artistic influences?

AS: The only key influence that has not been corrupted over time has been Velazquez, who every now and again disquiets me. There are works of art that are distantly watching us for years, mocking, challenging us, waiting for us to deepen our commitment, to raise our sensitivity to the minimum level at which their lessons nourish us instead of
poisoning. Understanding and assimilation of a master is a challenge I always pursue, as some sort of symbolic beheading ritual.

Besides Velazquez, I can mention Goya, Ribera, Sorolla… later came Freud, Saville, Barceló … and more recently I´ve seen certain works of great interest by Andreas Hofer, Zhou Chunya, Daniele Galliano, Andreas Golder and David Schnell.

Tdf: A number of artists have painted carcasses, Rembrandt, Soutine andJenny Saville all took on the carcass of a pig as a motif for their painterly explorations. What is it about the carcass, and particularly the pig, which you think has driven you, and perhaps others, to this subject?

AS: For me the transition from portraits to the pig´s masks was natural. In the portraits the importance is based primarily on the ability to grasp a unique psychological essence during my private dialogue with it. However, at a certain point, painting itself asked me for more freedom, adapting it to an exact resemblance seemed to be conditioning its wide potential. Every time I start working it implies learning and reflection, thus renouncing the spirit for the flesh offered me valuable lessons, the structure without resemblance was freedom and joy, pure dance to almost reach the vertigo of abstraction.

There are of course anecdotes that led to the selection of the new imagery. Nevertheless I consider that once the departure words were assimilated, when they stopped making noise, just served as an excuse to fertilize the job. I´d also like to point out that anecdotes might destroy in the viewer the unique opportunity for the slow language of painting to transmit, instead providing “literary railings” from which leaning out over the cliff, inviting him to take pictures, instead of challenging him to understand what remains invisible.

Tdf: You seem to build up your surfaces in a very particular way. An almost fluorescent pink seems to be laid down first, later consciously loose highlights are laid over more meticulous surfaces. Talk us through your process.

AS: Indeed, I build surfaces from the inside out, as if they were sculptures, so that the skin itself is constructed as a summary of everything contained in it. My essential technique is working with glazing, this is for me the most adequate technique capable of
creating living matter. Both gold and fluorescent pink, my favouriten bases, provide a valuable component of reflected light inside the paint, a certain glow of the flesh.

Federico García Lorca defined poetry as the “a word in the right time”. For me painting is also to be included in this definition. What I appreciate and seek is freshness, the speech short and efficient, but above all, the manifestation of sensitive intelligence. Painting is by nature a chaotic medium, I like to let it play free, watching, trying to lead it my way, and freezing it when alone or with my help does it approach subtly or blatantly a revelation.

Tdf: The light in your works hints at a certain desire for spirituality, perhaps transcendence. Is this a conscious aspect of your work?

AS: The creative act is essentially gratis, it has no other purpose than celebrating its own existence, it is not an answer but a proposal. The whole process, by choosing an image that serves as an excuse to talk about painting, is a search and tribute to the spirit or its lack. It may be that the light in a way uncovers that longing, as well as the inevitable presence of the others and the subsequent unsettling empathy, but in any case is not a conscious choice, soul happens.

Tdf: Rotting flesh, worn surfaces. Are your paintings fundamentally about transience? If so why?

AS: The ephemeral is a paradoxical aspect of what is implied in my work. Painting is plainly a different language, it fossilizes the marks and visual perception of who uses it, but always survives the creator and the images represented. Artwork that interests me is fortunately still more immortal than the worker. In some Egyptian sarcophagi an oil portrait of the deceased was added, I like to think that if embalming fluids preserves the body, oil painting in turn could be a form of embalming the image, a way to mummify the soul.
In the series “naturaleza muerta” and “gula”, the meat/flesh is treated as a neutral material, like a mask or a dress. It interests me as a parallel, extended reflection of how to represent the digested desire and its decontextualization, hunger facing bulimia, the metamorphosis of the object of desire that happens after the understanding or consumption of it and thereby, the ridiculous and doubtful existence of any undesired proposal.

antonio santin art blog

ART HONG KONG SOLO SHOW

from Antonio Santín

image at top: Antonio Santín, Schönleinstraße, 2010Oil on canvas, 240 x 180 cm

FILE ISSUE 3

SCOPE New York - WILDE Gallery

image at top:
Antonio Santín, Schönleinstraße, 2010
Oil on canvas, 240 x 180 cm