Jorge Rodríguez-Gerada Nyssa- The Portrait to Represent Us
Image courtesy of: Arsenio De Lara
Jorge
Rodríguez-Gerada
Nyssa-
The Portrait to Represent Us All
Huddling in
the front seat of a loaded down pickup truck filled with miscellaneous art
supplies, tools and papers, Jorge Rodríguez-Gerada and I sit,
staring off onto his plotted out parking lot pattern to talk about his larger
than life, “Terrestrial Series” portrait he completed in San Antonio for
Contemporary Art Month (CAM). Painted
directly onto the back parking lot of the Christopher Columbus Italian Society,
located at 201 Piazza Italia, Rodríguez-Gerada explains the premise and inspirations
behind his larger than life horizontal portraits.
As a personal guest of former VIA and Museo Alameda
Chairman, Owner of Muñoz and Company and political advocate Mr. Henry Muñoz,
Rodríguez-Gerada explained his journey to San Antonio and beyond. “I first met
Henry at the Smithsonian Gallery National Mall where I was doing a male
portrait titled, ‘Out of Many, One’, which was composed on six acres of land
next to the Reflecting Pool and by the National World War II Memorial. Henry
saw the work, liked what I was doing and we were familiar with each other from
other meetings at the annual Miami Basel art exhibition, so he invited me down
to San Antonio to commission me to do some artwork inspired by the people of
San Antonio and their own unique diversity. Henry is so passionate for his city
and its people, that it was a project I knew I wanted to be a part of,” he
says.
Jorge Rodríguez-Gerada’s signature portraits are
often acres long and wide, visually seen in whole only by satellite imagery,
drone photography or multi-storied building views. A sort of “contemporary
portraiture” that pushes the limitations of traditional portraits,
Rodríguez-Gerada’s wants the audience to experience his artwork on many levels;
from being able to walk into the artwork, become part of the experience, or see
it from above through photography via online; on our computer and cell phone
screens. He feels this is all part of his artwork, the physical presence of the
piece in the surround environments, how people interact with it and how they
perceive it through image.
Born in Santa Clara, Cuba Rodríguez-Gerada and his
parents fled the Castro regime and ended up in North Plainfield, New Jersey. At
19 he moved to Manhattan and emerged as a post-graffiti art commentator and
social artist. Rodríguez-Gerada dropped out of Jersey State College to pursue a
career in fine arts. He never feared he
would need a degree to achieve his dreams of being a successful artist.
“If you shoot for the stars you will at least reach
the moon”, he says.
Rodríguez-Gerada had many hardships along the way, including
fathering a child with a severe neurological disorder. Financial strains of
this medical condition affected his family.
“Dealing with his condition was a financial whirlwind. Our son was on a
cocktail of seizure medicines which put him in a vegetative state. In
Barcelona, Spain I found alternative treatments for my son, so I moved my
family there.”
Once in Barcelona, he took an almost 6 year “hiatus”
from art to deal with his family. In 2006 he started to work on some original
ideas, pushing the envelope of his previous post-graffiti, ‘culture-jamming’
social artwork.
“I wanted to push the limits of contemporary
portraits,” he says. “These kind of monumental images are a powerful way to
talk about the moments…the moments in time.
Every one of my art pieces are based on a place, and I go to places to
tell a story.”
With the “Terrestrial portrait” of a little girl
named Nyssa Gomez, Rodríguez-Gerada addresses the diverse populations of San
Antonio. He explains that there has been
a spike in the births of girls in San Antonio which will have numerical effects
for the future of the city. He is also intrigued by parts of San Antonio that
are not delineated by racial divides; something he sees throughout the world in
his travel –Belfast and the Middle East.
He points to a newly poured concrete patch on the
parking lot, left of the truck cab.
“There is where archeologists think the first San Antonio settlement was,”
he said. “When you look back in history
everything is interlaced, interlocked with interchanges of cultures”, he
explains. “I want to celebrate who we are today… I want to give homage to
that.”
“Nyssa was picked at random, a sort of artist
lottery,” he says. Rodríguez-Gerada saw Nyssa and thought her profile reflected
an accurate depiction of the “New San Antonio.”
“I want you to take away that this portrait can be
any little girl, anyone from San Antonio; enjoy her content gaze, it’s intent…
you can feel she is from a nurtured family, her parents are engaged with her
personal development. I am painting her portrait here at the beginning of San Antonio
- the original settlement.” Her face
will be visible from the highway interchanges to the left of the parking lot
downtown and will face the new San Pedro Creek development project (development headed by Muñoz and Company).
“This is the future of San Antonio, facing the past,”
he explains. “There is so much growth in San Antonio, so much diversity and it
keeps getting bigger with more and more innovation.”
As an artist I have a duty to embrace cultures,
there is a need to reflect, no one gets to choose where they are born… if we
look deeply, deep down, we are all the same.”
Jorge Rodríguez-Gerada completed his San Antonio
portrait in three days and wrapped up his sojourn in San Antonio with an artist
discussion at the Alameda Theater, hosted by Muñoz and Company on Sunday, March
29, 2015.
For more information on Jorge Rodríguez-Gerada and
his large scale “terrestrial” portraits, visit www.jorgerodriguezgerada.com.
© Gabriel Diego Delgado
Gallery Director
J.R. Mooney Galleries- Boerne
This article can be seen published in the April edition of Plumage-TX Magazine at:
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