trámite: hsiao...

Recently checked out a gallery closing of Trámite: Hsiao (a creative interpretation of the Chinese classic scroll "Hsing-Ching", The Classic of Filial Piety, an exhibit by Miguel Trelles at The Gabarron Foundation. Trelles reproduces the practice of painting from reproductions, creating a body of work that proceeds as a consequence of an individual’s respectful engagement with copies of works of art that do exist, and that form the very foundation of a culture in a perfected form. Trelles’ paintings do not aim to be copies in the spirit of the originals, much like the copies by Chinese artists themselves. In this exhibit the scrolls are re-interpreted in the style of mayan codexes.

This 'Chino Latino' styles points to quintessential Postmodernist ideas of the decenteredness of meaning, the valorization of autonomy, the regained importance of the local and the particular, the recombination of values, and towards the infinite possibilities of the human existence. But quite frankly all post-modern art is a juxtaposition of disparate elements and tends to refer to a cultural, intellectual, or artistic state lacking a clear central hierarchy or organizing principle and embodying extreme complexity, contradiction, ambiguity, diversity, interconnectedness or interreferentiality, in a way that is often indistinguishable from a parody of itself. It has given rise to charges of fraudulence. Who the hell knows nowadays? Creativity is hard enough, much respect to anyone who is so fortunate as to be touched by such inspiration...

"Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties"

~Eric Fromm