Pattern can mean a sample of something in order to show what it looks like, or an example to copy, or a design or arrangement of repeated lines or shapes.

The title Black Patterns refers directly to the development undergone by each and every work on exhibit and the production process in the form of “pattern making”, working from a prior plan to reproduce it in three dimensions.

This exercise entailed first conceiving the works in drawings and then turning them into three-dimensional objects or sculptures. As a sculptor I always start off by working on the design (perhaps because I studied this discipline); I am not the kind of artist who just picks up a piece of material and models it to create something; at least not at the initial stages. I like this dimension in which the mind outlines a road map whose final destination is the realization of the idea. This expectation conditions its character through a decision-taking process that wavers between know-how and intuition, between the initial concept and the actual construction. This methodology also has a bearing on the choice of materials, which is why I took the decision to work with a very narrow list, focusing particularly on categorical aspects of their different properties. These aspects, mainly their malleability, condition the process of production, facing me with elements which, whenever I come across them in objects and archetypes that have an erotic effect on me, produce a sensation similar to an irrational spasm, like a sign of life putting me in touch with an instinctive way of thinking. This comes into being, develops, is transmitted, disappears, transforms and appears again, enhanced by the dexterity of language and the fertile ground of contemporary mythologies. I have to admit that at a certain point during the process this all became really frustrating, in the way it challenged me technically, forcing me to question myself and to take a stance, whether above or below the relationship, constantly paying attention to the negotiation between my desire and the vitality of the material. This, or perhaps beforehand, is where black makes an appearance; a pattern, a colour, a monochrome perception that runs throughout the exhibition.

This is divided into three groups in three spaces:

Besides the title of the exhibition, Black Patterns is also the name for the group of works on view in the Estudio space. I was not thinking of making clothes when I conceived these works, but rather in stripping bare a structure, watching the skin fall off like in Wilhelm Lembruck’s figures. The installation consists of a series of bodies made from pieces of leather that are entwined by means of stitching or metal zips. The sculptures are installed like columns that levitate between ceiling and floor, while one of the pieces is transferred to the wall, thus returning to the original plan from which it came.

The gallery’s Hall space hosts two groups of works made with the same material which explore the idea of the hole, a hard-to-grasp entity that is omnipresent in our environs, the interstice through which casual events come into being, links that join different bodies and help to create new connections. Nothing Young is made from rubber pieces embossed with the logo “NY” which are laced together at several different points, so that the icon is deformed and disassociated from its original image and produces other forms. Also on view in the same space is the series Gradiens (#1, #2, #3, #4), four sheets of rubber on which cuts have been made although without fully extricating them from the support, instead leaving them hanging from it. Openings that not only invite you to look, but also to be looked at. Some have a rhythm marked by a lacquer of varnish.

Finally, a site-specific work has been made for the gallery rooftop. With it, I wished to fulfil something greater than my own desire, whose expectation would be difficult to satisfy, forcing me to rethink the whole process. I created a white canvas sheath to cover one of the skylights. Placing it outdoors in the elements means that it will be affected by the rain, sunlight and dust and its colour will gradually transform until becoming its opposite. In this work there is a direction relationship between the body, space and the gaze, so that once installed I decided to make a series of photographs of the site intervened, confronting the human figure and the architecture, this time using the work of the photographer Alvin Baltrop as my pattern.