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"Critical
Mass (frontal View)", 2004
mixed media wall: 10' x 14' Enclosed Space: 12' x 8' x 14' |
"Un
Lugar Para Todo (Detail)", 2004
mixed media |
"Blue
Vertigo", 2003
ink on paper 54.5" x 122" |
"Black
Vertigo II", 2003
ink on paper 54.5" x 40" |
click on the thumbnails above for a larger image
Artist Statement
The landscape that we live in has become saturated with signs of the easy mobility, speed, constant communication, imposition of structure, insistence on growth and glorification of technology that have come to be so characteristic of our society today. My work incorporates these signs, exaggerating and reconfiguring them in order to build maps that convey the sense of wonder and vertigo that is inevitable as we face the landscape of today’s world. I draw on the visual language of cartography in order to evoke the idea of mapping, although my maps do not refer to actual places. Neither are they depictions of utopias or dystopias; they are maps that represent how our actual world is structured, not on a literally geographical, but on an experiential level.
The physical process of building each piece reflects the evolution that urban landscape undergoes. In the accretion of imagery and physical material, a history and structure are built in my work that reflect the layers of architecture, history, technology and topography that make up the world depicted.
I use the language of printmaking to address the processes of automation and mass production that have brought today’s world into existence. The specific media of intaglio, woodblock and drawing that I choose to work with, however, are still closely linked to the artist’s hand and allow the work to be about my own attempt as an individual to come up with a system of navigating this overwhelming landscape instead of simply consuming one of the pre-fabricated, mass-produced and –marketed versions, of which there are so many.
As with the evolution of the human-built landscape, there are moments in the construction of my world where the building proceeds according to plans that have already been laid and there are moments when the building precedes its own planning, expanding unpredictably and organically towards an order of a very different sort. Our world is full of the tension between just this order and disorder and my work focuses on that tension, creating images of landscapes that struggle against themselves, that strive towards order and beauty as they verge on the edge of spinning beyond control or comprehension. The maps and images that I create do not propose a clearly navigable territory or a clear destination, but ask the question of where we really are and where we might be going.
Nicola Lopez
EDUCATION, HONOR
| 2005 | Recipient of 2005 NYFA Fellowship in Drawing/Printmaking/Book Arts |
| 2004 | Joan
Mitchell Foundation MFA Graduate Award Mortimer Frank Traveling Fellowship; Awarded by Columbia University; NY, NY Assilah Summer Moussem Artist Residency; Assilah, Morocco MFA Columbia University; New York, NY |
| 2002 | Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture; Skowhegan, ME |
| 1998-99 | Mortimer Hays-Brandeis Traveling Fellowship, awarded by Brandeis University; Brandeis, Mass. |
| 1998 | B.A. Columbia University; New York, NY |
| 1996 | Attended Escola de Artes Visuais (School of Visual Arts); Rio de Janeiro, Brasil |
| 1994 | Internship at the Tamarind Institute; Albuquerque, NM |
INDIVIDUAL AND TWO-PERSON EXHIBITIONS
| 2005 | Nicola
Lopez / John Copeland (two-person exhibit); Irvine Contemporary Art; Washington,
DC “Vertigo” Caren Golden Fine Art; NY, NY |
| 2004 | “Saturación II” (two-person exhibit) Galeria Biblioteca Lino Picaseno, UNAM, Ciudad de Mexico, Mexico |
| 2003 | “Saturación”
(two-person exhibit) Instituto de Artes Graficos de Oaxaca; Oaxaca, Mexico “Maps and Other Myths” LACS Gallery at SUNY Stony Brook; Stony Brook, NY |
| 1999 | “Rescatando
la Historia” Museo de Arte Contemporaneo; Cusco, Peru “Transplantes” Taller de Manuel; Cusco, Peru |
| 1997 | Untitled (two-person exhibit) Postcrypt Gallery, St. Paul’s Chapel, Columbia University; NY, NY |
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
| 2006 | “Activator” Bates College Museum; Lewiston, Maine |
| 2005 | “Greater
New York 2005” PS1 Contemporary Art Center; Queens, NY ARCO 05; Madrid, Spain “Micro Universe: Visions of the Artist’s Mind” The Lab Gallery; NY, NY |
| 2004 | “Merry”
Sideshow; Brooklyn, NY “Desire Lines” Fusebox; Washington, DC “After Goya” LeRoy Neiman Gallery; Columbia University, NY, NY “Atravesando Fronteras” El Museo Cultural; Santa Fe, NM “Freehand” Marvelli Lab; Brooklyn, NY “Object of Desire” LeRoy Neiman Gallery; Columbia University, NY, NY “SuperSalon” Samson Projects; Boston, MA |
| 2003 | “Merry”
Sideshow; Brooklyn, NY “Dress Me Up” SOIL Art Gallery; Seattle, WA |
| 2002 | “Procession”
LeRoy Neiman Gallery, Columbia University; NY, NY “Myth and Hybrid” LeRoy Neiman Gallery, Columbia University; NY, NY “Bon a Tirer” Brooklyn Front Gallery; Brooklyn, NY “Artist Books” Holland Tunnel; Brooklyn, NY “In Xochitl In Cuicatl : Flor y Canto : Reflections from Nuevo Mexico” Museum of International Folk Art; Santa Fe, NM |
| 2001 | “Artist
Books and Folios” LeRoy Neiman Gallery, Columbia University; NY, NY “Brewster Project”; Site-specific Arts Event; Brewster, NY |
| 2000 | “Territorios Colindantes” El Museuo Cultural, sponsored by La Voz Festival de las Americas; Santa Fe, NM |
| 1999 | “Muestra Pictórica Colectiva de la Sociedad de Artistas del Cusco” Museo de Arte Contemporaneo; Cusco, Peru |
Contact
Information
979 Dean St. Brooklyn, NY 11238
nicola@nicolalopez.com