Galeria Contrast
Spain
Galeria Contrast from Barcelona specialises in contemporary figurative art based on the techniques of Spanish masters such as Velázquez, Goya, Sorolla and others. The gallery's artists are aware of their place in this rich artistic tradition and bring the concepts and techniques of the masters to contemporary art.
In doing so, they create relevant and expressive images full of meaning, critical questioning and a point of view that represents our society today.
Heritage is a recurrent theme in the programme of the Contrast gallery. Spain has a long and rich artistic tradition. Masters such as Velazquez, Goya, El Greco, Dali, Picasso, Miró and many others have their place in art history. The gallery features painters and sculptors, as well as photographers and performance artists, who draw inspiration from these masters and incorporate them into new, contemporary works.
Can a painting be inspired by classical techniques and palettes and be conceptual at the same time? The painter Rafel Bestard proves that this is possible. His starting point is the development of complex concepts, from philosophy to spiritual feelings, which he translates into tangible actions with the help of his models (dancers, actors, performers, musicians, etc.).
Íñigo Navarro, on the other hand, is a painter who always goes back to history to create symbols that enable him to judge our behaviour today. One of his iconic paintings, for example, is "The werewolf carton mask", a symbol of the ambivalence inherent in our nature: man pretends to conquer the world through civilisation, when in reality something deep inside him is linked to a natural and wild instinct.
Tania Font is a sculptor who deconstructs busts to represent an inner state rather than a face. She deliberately smashes the heads of her sculptures to express feelings or memories hidden in small destroyed houses.
Gerard Mas creates amazing sculptures inspired by Renaissance and Baroque aesthetics, hieratic figures transformed into pop art by inserting objects such as plastic bags or chewing gum.
The gallery owners are art lovers. But Galeria Contrast also wants to penetrate social structures, identifying and communicating their symbols, actions and values. In this way, an art gallery can help create identity and awareness of social heritage.
Rafel Bestard
Rafel Bestard: Negotiation / Oil on canvas, 200x150cm / Courtesy of Galeria Contrast
Rafel Bestard was born in Mallorca, Spain in 1967. He graduated in Fine Arts from the University of Barcelona in 1990. Bestard was professor of drawing at the ESADIB in Palma de Mallorca until 2012. He gives courses and seminars on the theory and history of contemporary art at the Fundació Pilar i Joan Miró, the Juan March Foundation and Casal Solleric. Rafel Bestard also gives painting workshops with Antonio Lopez at the Francisco de Goya Chair, Museo Casa Ibañez and Albacete City Council.
His first solo exhibition was held in 1996 at the now defunct Galeria Mediterrania in Palma. Since then he has exhibited regularly in galleries, art fairs, museums and art centres. Together with his partner and fellow artist, Ana Del Valle, they have been invited to be Artists in Residence at RiddergadeAIR, the art residency programme of Viborg Kunsthal, Denmark, for the summer of 2018.
«My working procedure begins staging personal encounters, in my studio, with close people. I document these meetings by means of photographs. I use these pictures as references to my paintings, that therefore are the final form of a process based on a photo document based on a performance. With my subjects I try to display a broad range of evocative powers with the simplest things or gestures. On each one of my paintings something is trying to break through. Embracing communication problems with my beloved ones, references to the world: complex, distorted, with autobiographical interpretations, between feelings of safety and uncertainty, melancholy and hope, resignation and defiance. Emotional tension between affection and detachment is present.» - Rafel Bestard
Íñigo Navarro
Inigo Navarro: Las piernas de Apolo / Oil on canvas, 81x100cm / Courtesy of Galeria Contrast
Íñigo Navarro (Madrid, 1977) graduated in Fine Arts from the UCM (Universidad Complutense de Madrid) and in Mathematics from the UAM (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid). He began his career as a director, scriptwriter and photographer, where he has had some success at the Rhinebeck Independent Festival in the USA, the Delph Festival and the Photoespaña Discoveries Award. His first solo exhibition abroad was at the Irvine Contemporary Gallery in Washington in 2006. Since then he has exhibited regularly at national and international fairs and galleries.
He is currently working with Contrast Gallery in Barcelona and Heissings Art in Berlin. In recent years, international solo exhibitions in Blue Spiral, North Caroline, USA (2019), Léna and Roselli, Budapest (2018), Jorge Alcolea, Madrid (2009) stand out. As well as the collaborations in Barcelona Gallery Weekend (2018) and the previous year in Berlin Gallery Weekend. In recent years he has also participated in the Scope Basel, Volta Basel, Kunstrai Amsterdam, Art Karlsruhe and Context Art Miami art fairs. He has also received eleven awards and participated in the travelling exhibition "Europa Aperto", which took place in Trento, Berlin and Sarajevo, the same year he arrived in Asian countries, exhibiting in Beijing, China and in Seoul, Korea (2006).
«Art is what it is and it is very simple, you see it, you understand it, you contemplate it, you admire it and so on, but the most important thing is that it inspires you; because what you can't see or understand gets you nowhere. If it's such an abstract idea that you need to read the Library of Alexandria to understand it, it might just be headless bustle or mindlessness.» - Íñigo Navarro
Tania Font
Tania Font: Deconstruction / Sculpture in cement, 60x60x40cm / Courtesy of Galeria Contrast
Tania Font was born in Palamós, Catalonia, Spain, in 1978. She began studying drawing and painting at the age of 6. At the age of 17 she enrolled in the Fine Arts Department, where she experimented with different media such as engraving, wax and bronze applied to jewellery and sculpture, and later at the Joos (School of Visual Arts) she started experimenting with polymer modelling, fantastic realism and airbrushing applied to sculpture.
In 2001 she graduated in Fine Arts and began to work with major Spanish scenographic design companies. She began to work on hyper-realism and scientific sculpture for major projects and exhibitions in museums such as La Caixa Foundation and the Science Museum of Barcelona, as well as conservation work for the Dalí Museum.
In 2012, after many years of working in Materia-Zero, her own production company, she decided to focus on her artistic interests through sculpture, creating works for art exhibitions in different galleries and cultural centres, such as Barcelona's Nau Bostik, Sala Nuria Hosta, Espai G Gallery, among others. She recently presented a solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Sculpture Vilacasas Foundation.
«I speak out through my sculpture much better than with my voice... About isolation, about the noise caused by thoughts within a closed circuit of neuroatypical mental processes and how, sometimes, we can feel that they surpass us. This is the concept of the series "Deconstruction" , in which I am immersed. Internal thoughts that can make us break our heads.» - Tania Font
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