Artusnow
- vor 15 Stunden
- 6 Min. Lesezeit

Using Art as a tool to explore different layers of reality

Interview with Artusnow

1. Please tell us something about your background and your art journey so far.

I think I could be defined as an explorer of realities: I use art to push the spectators to turn inward, exploring the depths of their Being. I try to take them on a journey of self-exploration where they can discover different layers of reality, using different layers of photographs to create a new, more dreamlike reality that comes directly from the heart of things.

For instance, using digital tools, I dived into my own artwork, called “Sirene 2” (75 x 100 cm, printed on 5mm Dibond Aluminum) to create this other artwork, called “Tesoro Escondido 3” (50 x 50 cm, printed on 5mm Dibond Aluminum).

My mother is an artist, and I started very early in my childhood, to explore different creative techniques: pencil, paper painting, silk painting, until later on I chose photography as the main means of expression. Visual art has always been a constant in my life, my secret garden, something which only until recently I have begun to have the courage to share with others.

When I was 20 years old, I loved to take black and white nude photos, like this one:

I still use some of these photos taken many years ago, to create my artwork today. For me, giving new meaning from black and white nudes to convey purity and beginning, to color and deeper spiritual meaning which inspires me today.

I also enjoy working with musicians and poets to create immersive artworks that allow people to find the path towards their interior in a more explicit way. You can find here an example of an exhibition and a video-poem created with Vera Moreno, a poetess from Madrid in 2023: https://youtu.be/MTZWl_8ThNU?si=FMS4eOtaDADHt9AI

2. Can you tell us more about the theme in your art and your inspiration?

Vincent Van Gogh said : "Keep your love for nature, because it is the true way to understand art more and more", and that’s what I’m doing. My main inspirations are Nature, The Human Body and Textures.

NATURE: The shapes, textures and colors of nature are infinite. I love mixing them to create new visual sensations.

HUMAN BODY: The ancient Greeks thought that nudes could express an ideal of divine perfection, both psychic and physical. For me, they still have this power of invocation of divine perfection incarnated in forms.

TEXTURES: Textures are the essence of my work. They are everywhere, on an old door repainted many times, the wings of a butterfly, posters glued and torn, the delicate petals of a flower, a graffitied wall, the bark of a tree or a burnt garbage can, but they’re still invisible to most people. I integrate them into my paintings to give them a life of their own, which sometimes brings them closer to Street Art.

3. How does your art life impact other parts of your life?

Personally, I think life is a spiritual journey. For me, Art is a tool to understand different realities that are not perceived by the majority of people. That’s why my signature, which is present on all my paintings, is an open eye.

As we explore spirituality, we discover that we have 7 bodies, embedded in each other like Russian dolls. Each of these bodies correspond to a different layer of reality (physical, etherical, mental, emotional, etc.) that we discover in our spiritual quest. These layers are "inner worlds" that exist on their own, ready to be explored by those who have understood the limits of the material world.

The series of six paintings “Parallel Universes” shows these different worlds that can be explored when we find the door in our heart… So, I could say that in my case, this is my spiritual life that impacts my artistic life! ;-)

4. Could you share any difficulties and hardships you had to face in life and how or if you managed/overcame them?

Six years ago, my wife died of cancer and it has been the most painful experience of my life. It destroyed the foundations of all that I believed in and when she finally passed away, after 5 long years of struggle, nothing was left of my old life. Only ashes and my 10 years-old son.

I had to reconstruct everything from zero. It was a very hard time and I spent months not knowing which direction to take. The only thing I knew was that my life wasn't going to be the same.

Finally, 3 things have appeared as constants in my life, things that have always been in my heart and will always be there until the day I die: my Son, Spirituality and Art. That’s why I decided to rebuild my life based on these 3 pillars.

5. Tell us about your best experience in the art world so far.

I really enjoy using art to give places a new meaning, so when a German company called me in 2021 to create a mural for their new offices in Madrid, I was very excited. The artwork had to integrate the different activities of the company and the colors of its logo. It was therefore a challenge, especially as the dimensions were an imposing: 2.7 m x 6.5 m.

In 2023, I was also very grateful when The Vintage Company ordered 10 of my artworks for an exhibition in a place that I love and is truly iconic in Madrid: the cultural center “Casa de Vacas” in the Retiro park. The exhibition was very successful and attracted over 14,000 people. For this exhibition, I chose to revisit characters from Star Wars and to make Fan-art, something new to me, and I’m very satisfied with the result (75 x 100 cm, printed on 5mm Dibond Aluminum) :

6. Share your worst experience in the art world.

In the art world, as an emerging artist, I often feel like a small fish in an aquarium full of sharks. It’s as if the people and the market players who should be there to help you grow and support are really only just looking for your money.

This is the case of 99% of the art magazines, galleries, contests, prizes and everyone who has contacted me through Instagram and other social networks, except the Goddessarts Magazine.

For instance, a well-known gallery in Madrid contacted me to participate in a collective exhibition… In the end, they asked me for 6000€ to exhibit 5 artworks during a month, selling me that they would take care of my online branding! The worst thing is that there are a lot of artists who are so desperate (because they cannot exhibit their artworks in good places), that they are forced to go through this exploitative process!

For me, there is really a huge problem with galleries that do not play their role of detecting and making new artists known. And on social networks, there is really a confusion between having talent to communicate (meaning having talent to adapt yourself to the formats and rhythm of diffusion imposed by each platform) and the artistic talent.

To sum up, as an emerging artist, you have the choice to be swindled and exploited by galleries who rent their walls as if they were AirBnB apartments or algorithms that simply seek sensationalism and do not make the difference between an artistic nude and pornography...

My personal conclusion is that this is very sad situation and as a result Humanity is losing an incalculable amount of artistic talent in all fields (visual arts, poetry, music, dance, etc.) due to this unjust and restricitive system. What percentage of emerging artists can live from their artworks today? And how will they become recognized artists if they cannot devote themselves to create and have to spend 80% of their time working in other fields and the rest on social media? If Art is the most brilliant expression of a civilization, what does this say about us as society?

7. What are you working on at the moment and are there any upcoming events you would like to talk about?

I am now specializing in creating very large, custom-made artworks for specific locations such as offices, hotels, restaurants, hospitals, foundations, etc., because it is a way for me to know that my artworks have a specific meaning for the buyer and will be seen by a wide audience, which is not the case in a gallery.

For example, I’m working on a painting for a restaurant that will be called "The green lizard". I am also working on a project for a palliative care foundation for children. Both are murals and the painting for the foundation will be very large: 3 m x 8 m.

I’m also very glad to have a digital solo exhibition with 42 paintings in the Goddessarts Magazine place that you can see here from the 15th of September to the 15th of October 2024: https://artspaces.kunstmatrix.com/en/exhibition/13549890/artusnow-world-textures-and-colors

Also, 2 of my artworks are currently online for an international auction on the site of SETDART: https://www.setdart.com/subasta/displayimage/pintura-siglo-xxi/pid=351382182/newlang=english.html