Monday, February 24, 2020

Raphael Trelles: The Imagined Word
Point of Contact Gallery

Price: Free
Point of Contact Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

Rafael Trelles, from Santurce, Puerto Rico, is a painter, printmaker, installation artist, stage and costume designer. Trelles completed his Bachelors' Degree at the University of Puerto Rico, and his Doctorate from Escuela Nacional de Artes Plásticas (Academia San Carlos). In the mid-1980s, Trelles resided in the Canary Islands, where he produces a series of paintings titled The Universal Tarot, resembling his later works use of mysticism and magic. Returning to Puerto Rico in 1986, he dedicated himself to his art and to the artist group El Alfil (Image and Word), which he co-founded in 1994. Trelles also does public art using a pressure hose on walls, sidewalks, and other surfaces, a genre he calls "urban graphic art" seen in the 2007 documentary En Concreto (On Concrete). The film illustrates this experimental graphic work originally designed for abandoned sectors of worldwide cities.

In "The Imagined Word," Trelles employs references to Hispanic mythology and world literature. Influenced by surrealist Max Ernst, he brings the viewer on a voyage to an esoteric world of characters in dreamlike settings, where solitude reigns.