Is the Glass Half Empty or Half Full?

Curator / Curaduría: Lucrecia Piedrahíta

Solo Show
2007
Museo El Castillo
Medellín, Colombia

Aníbal Paints the Nostalgia

EL COLOMBIANO Newspaper
LIFE AND CULTURE
February 22, 2008
By: Carmen Alicia Gutierrez


Aníbal Vallejo evokes memories and pours them onto canvas, alternating between pencils, brushes and needles. In his work, nothing is fortuitous and everything responds to the artist's nostalgia. His leitmotiv is the memories of events that he once saw and impacted him, whether they were from his childhood or events that marked universal history, such as the massacre of the Romanov family or the Duke of Austria Franz Ferdinand. "These are topics that call my attention, I investigate them and then I do that mix of things, from my personal life with historical and literary facts."

The exhibition
The 29 paintings that make up the exhibitionIs the glass half empty or half full? intertwine various forms of expression. Anibal’s artistic creation is a mixture of drawing, painting, sewing and embroidery. “I am more of a draftsman, so my favorite is pencil, but it is complemented with the paint stain, the patterned background cloth and the thread”, affirms Aníbal. And it is that his paintings use different techniques that he has experienced and that he liked. Among them, of course, there had to be a space for his passion for fashionable materials, hence that original touch of adding fabrics, prints, threads and sewing.

The artist is made
The blood of artists runs through Aníbal Vallejo's veins, although for him the artist is not born but is made through “a lot, a lot of effort”. In addition to being the nephew of the controversial writer Fernando Vallejo, “my father and mother have been involved in art all their lives. My dad is a painter and has been a curator. Since I was little, I had a lot of contact with museums, so I was predetermined or marked by this”, he assures. Apparently his two older sisters thought the same thing and that is why they dedicated their lives to music, interpreting instruments such as the piano, the guitar and the flute and even one of them recently leaned towards literature.

In an environment full of art, Aníbal knew from an early age what he wanted to be.
He studied six semesters of Visuals Arts at the University of Antioquia and one year of Fashion Design at the Colombian College of Design. He finally decided to leave the country because he felt denied as an artist. At 32, he knows that this trip gave him the maturity he expected, he was inspired by cities like London, Berlin and New York, which for him reflect the best of the world.

His work premieres in Colombia, but his career is long: he has exhibited in Milan, Florence, New York and Madrid.

Art that is nostalgic.