CHEMA MADOZ
Extended through November 12, 2011
Opening reception
Saturday, October 8, 2011 from 5- 8 PM
This is the 3rd solo exhibition at PDNB Gallery for Spanish
artist, Chema Madoz (b. 1958).
Click to view more images from this exhibition
Chema’s studio in Madrid is filled with an assortment of objects including: candles, a dart board, chess board, hour glass, women’s shoes, birdcages, a hunting bow, books and a disco globe. All these curiosities are combined to create a surreal photographic image that questions what, how, why.
“Juxtapose” is used often in the art world and is especially meaningful when describing Chema’s imagery that combines such diverse objects. For example, a world globe is replaced with a disco ball. A martini glass holds a musical note instead of an olive. A baseball bat supports the lid of a grand piano. A protractor becomes a radiant sunset. These cerebral subjects offer humorous, poetic or sometimes biting commentary.
Surrealist artists, Salvador Dali and Rene Magritte, and the father of psychology, Sigmund Freud, have certainly influenced this artist’s ouevre. We are reminded of Dali’s melting time pieces in Persistence of Memory, and Magritte’s painting of a pipe which includes the line, “Leci n’est pas une pipe” (“This is not a pipe”).
Renowned American photographer, Duane Michals, also influenced by the Surrealists, states in Chema Madoz's recent book,*
"Should Chema choose to photograph you as a shoe,
suddenly you would become a Jimmy Choo, just like
that." -Duane Michals
In 2000 he received Spain's National Photography Award, the PhotoEspaña Prize and the Higashikawa Prize. His first retrospective , Objetos 1990-1999, was held at the Reina Sofía Museum, Madrid. And Spain's Ministry of Culture organized the Chema Madoz 2000-2005 exhibition which traveled throughout Europe.
Chema’s photographs are in many important museums and corporate art collections including the Reina Sofía Museum, Madrid, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, The Museum of Fine Arts, Buenos Aires, D.G. Bank, Frankfurt, and the Circulo de Bellas Artes, Madrid.
*Chema Madoz: Obras Maestras
La Fabrica Publisher
Spain
