Ángela de la Cruz

At first glance, the paintings of Ángela de la Cruz (A Coruña, 1965) seem to have been smashed or flagrantly abused. The deformed or broken frames and the twisted canvases are then hung on the wall or placed on the floor as trophies. Even though this act of modifying the forms is totally deliberate and systematic, it is he himself who reports the final result. Emotionally raw, astute, and sharply ironic, de la Cruz poses his vision of the language of painting, incorporating the self-destruction of painting into the work itself: "The moment I cut the canvas, I get rid of the grandiosity of the history of painting". Violent, unapologetic and often blackly humorous, his work imperturbably exposes a visceral emotionality, breaking the barriers of established pictorial norms. The implicit feeling left by the scenes is that an activity of frenzied violence has just occurred. Leaving in their wake the paradoxical feeling of an energy that is extinguished and a sense of calm that is both threatening and unavoidable.

Ángela de la Cruz (A Coruña, 1965) lives and works in London. She holds a degree in Philosophy and Arts from the University of Santiago de Compostela. In the late 1980s she moved to London to study at Chelsea College of Art and later at Goldsmiths College and Slade School of Art. Nominated for the Turner Prize in 2010, she received the Premio Nacional de Artes Plásticas in 2017. Recent solo exhibitions include Homeless at CGAC (2019) and Azkuna Zentroa (2018) and Escombros at Centro d'Art La Panera and Fundación Luis Seoane (2015), as well as several group exhibitions and private spaces. His work can be found in various museums and collections such as Artium~Centro Museo Vasco de Arte Contemporáneo, Vitoria, Spain; British Council, London; Iberdrola Collection, Madrid; Ma Cristina Masaveu Paterson Foundation Collection, Asturias, Spain; Fundación per l'Amort a l'Art Collection, Valencia, Spain; Contemporary Art Collection, Fundación La Caixa, Barcelona, Spain; Fundación Pedro Barrié de la Maza, A Coruña, Spain; Moderna Musset, Stockholm; Morgan Stanley Bank, London; Museo Helga de Alvear, Cáceres, Spain; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia; Patio Herreriano Museo de Arte Contemporáneo Español, Valladolid, Spain; Queensland Art Gallery, Queensland, Australia and TATE Collection, London.