ART
ANA MONTIEL
Questions about the nature of perception — the what, why, and how of consciousness — have been driving the work of Mexico-based artist Ana Montiel lately. And while any definitive answers to such age-old puzzles remain elusive, Montiel’s work provides a kind of aesthetic response, making those mysteries both visual and material. There’s a mesmeric, meditative quality to her canvas and digitally-created color field paintings, reminiscent of the Light & Space art of the ’60s and ’70s. Something quietly active occurs while viewing them, though the works themselves are static; engaging with her pieces and the ideas behind them can encourage a kind of headiness, but her work is also just a pleasure to look at. The intensity and commitment she brings to her artistic process — from reading in-depth about quantum physics and neuroscience to experimenting with altered states — is visible in what she creates but it’s also balanced by a lightness and ethereality.
In the last few years, Montiel has shown internationally art galleries, as she’s moved around the world herself. Montiel was born and raised in Logroño, Spain. Pursuing her BFA brought her to the University of Barcelona, and she stayed in that city for over a decade before moving to London. After five years there, a visit to Mexico City convinced her that’s where she wanted to be. “When I got back to London, I gave away around 95 percent of my stuff and moved, with just two suitcases and my elderly cat.” It’s been a productive, generative shift for Montiel. For over three years now, she’s made her home in Tepoztlan, a village about an hour outside of Mexico City. “The rural pace tames my hyperactive mind and lets me concentrate on my practice.”
FIELDS 5 (opening of the senses), UV-cured latex inks on canvas, 130 x 180cm | 51.18 x 70.86, 2018
FIELDS 36 (futur echoes-messages), UV-cured latex inks on canvas, 200 x 130cm | 78.74 x 51.18, 2018
Regarding consciousness (l), 150 x 120 cm | 59 x 47,24, 2018
An exchange without time, two 91.44 x 121.92 cm paintings | two 36 x 48 inch paintings, pigment and acrylic paint on stretched cotton canvas, 2018
A non-space for devotion, 91.44 x 121.92 cm | 36 x 48 inch, pigment and acrylic paint on stretched cotton canvas, 2018
Another win, 91.44 x 121.92 cm | 36 x 48 inch, pigment and acrylic paint on stretched cotton canvas, 2018
FIELDS 59 (between knowing and not knowing), 130 x 200 cm | 51.18 x 78.74, UV cured inks on aluminium Dibond, 2018
Eons of not knowing, 91.44 x 121.92 cm | 36 x 48 inch, pigment and acrylic paint on stretched cotton canvas, 2018
FIELDS : Inner monuments (the inner moon), archival pigment print on cotton paper, Edition of 3 + 2 AP, 110 x 160cm | 43.3 x 63, 2018
FIELDS 45 (the illusion of time of time and space-the illusion of separation), archival pigment print on cotton paper, edition of 3, 100 x 100cm | 39.37 x 39.37, 2018
FIELDS 24, the unfamiliar become intimate, archival pigment print on cotton paper edition of 3, 130 x 93cm | 51.18 x 36.6, 2018
FIELDS 41 (fire as our teacher’s teacher), UV cured inks on aluminium Dibond, 150 x 150cm | 59 x 59, 2018
FIELDS 61 (presence is expansion, presented as an immesurable, pure, eternal now), UV cured inks on aluminium Dibond, 150 x 150 cm | 59 x 59, 2018
FILEDS 47 (the shadows of our future selves), UV-cured inks on Dibond Aluminium, 100 x 150cm | 39.37 x 59, 2018
Inner music, two 91.44 x 121.92 cm paintings | Two 36 x 48 inch paintings, pigment and acrylic paint on stretched cotton canvas. 2018
In the center of the fire, 91.44 x 121.92 cm | 36 x 48 inch, pigment and acrylic paint on stretched cotton canvas, 2018
FIELDS 60 (messages between words), 150 x 200 cm | 59 x 78.74 in, UV cured inks on aluminium Dibond, 2018
Searching for meaning through time and space, 91.44 x 121.92 cm | 36 x 48 inch, pigment and acrylic paint on stretched cotton canvas, 2018
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