In a world the place noise and commotion are more and more prevalent, and the place it appears out of trend to not make one’s presence loudly felt, José Lerma provides a face to the bystanders and the silent witnesses within the again. However solely carefully—the faces he presents to us are, in spite of everything, stripped right down to their most simple options. Extremely stylized and inflexible, they preserve solely the naked necessities of facial construction in what the artist calls “the abstract of a portrait.” His work transcend mere illustration, teetering on the sting of abstraction.
The profile work in Bayamonesque are a cornerstone of José Lerma’s oeuvre. Over the previous decade and a half, since encountering Jean-Léon Gérôme’s ‘Reception of the Grand Condé by Louis XIV’ on the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, he has been captivated by the sparse brushstrokes with which Gérôme rendered background figures. Most of Lerma’s works are created in a single session. His medium—a heavy, unwieldy mix of building supplies and acrylics—dries shortly, leaving little to no margin for error. The immediacy of his course of carefully aligns together with his objective of capturing the quickness of a sketch.
Although the roots of Lerma’s concepts lie within the neoclassical and romantic traditions of Gérôme, he additionally attracts inspiration from the sketch-like qualities of the Bay Space Figurative Motion and the work of Belgian artist Bram Bogart. The latter reference comes as no shock: Bogart, a key determine in casual artwork, turned recognized for his thick, cement-like canvases. Lerma holds Bogart’s impasto-rich works in excessive regard: “Bogart set my blueprint. I simply hyper-stylized it.” As with Bogart, so too with Lerma—his plasticine-like textures evoke an virtually primal, childlike urge to achieve out and contact their provocative surfaces.
Bayamonesque marks the top of an period. The previous fifteen to eighteen years have led to the fruits of this profile collection as we all know it. José Lerma sees this physique of labor because the conclusion of his present creative cycle, bringing the viewer again to his homeland and the acquainted faces of his previous to finish this chapter. There are refined shifts, nonetheless—the pores and skin tones and floor colours now mirror extra vivid blues, reds, and greens, lending the figures an otherworldly, virtually synthetic glow. They appear much less illuminated by pure gentle and extra like they exist underneath a wholly totally different spectrum.
The title of the exhibition displays the interaction of opposites, a recurring theme all through Lerma’s profession. He grew up in Bayamón, an industrial suburb on the outskirts of Puerto Rico. Although not recognized for its picturesque qualities, Bayamón holds a particular place within the artist’s coronary heart, infusing this exhibition with a way of on a regular basis life. The quotidian nature of his hometown is made poetic by the suffix he provides to it, embodying the incongruity he delights in exploring. The profile work, in spite of everything, are constructed on an analogous distinction—balancing the surplus of thick impasto with the sparseness of only a few brushstrokes, and utilizing massive canvases to seize what are, primarily, sketches. Then once more, the abundance of fabric makes a Lerma work unattainable on a small scale.
The themes, some real-life acquaintances from Lerma’s native Puerto Rico and others pure invention, are chosen with a eager eye for element—or relatively, for the dearth of element he requires them to be portrayed successfully. The artist shortly discerns whether or not somebody lends themselves to this collection based mostly on sure defining traits. As Lerma himself places it: “The summary painter in me is, above all, drawn to sure individuals for particular options that may be damaged right down to their naked minimal as paintable components: an expressive cowl, a placing nostril, a particular form of lips.” Anybody might be captured in a portrait, however solely a choose few can embody the essence of José Lerma’s work.
