SOL CALERO. Solo Pintura

We are delighted to present, for the first time in Munich, an exhibition of works by the Venezuelan artist Sol Calero. In the past year she has received considerable attention for her colorful environments, which visitors encounter in the form of reconstructed shopping centers, travel agencies, hair salons, and movie theaters.

Solo Pintura is the second exhibition of Sol Calero’s work focused exclusively on her painting. In a new series of autonomous works, the artist continues her investigation of the formal language of Exoticism. Her pictures assimilate the typical aesthetic of Latin American folk art and at the same time question standardized notions of the “other.”

Calero’s new images have been inspired as much by the jungle as by urban scenes—lively places in which everything happens at the same time. Smells, sounds, textures, and visual impressions—new as well as ancient cultures—overlap one another, generate contrasts, and meld into a vibrant totality.

The color palette of these new compositions ranges from brilliant green, pink, yellow, and blue to different shades of brown and thus corresponds to the entire spectrum of colors that Calero has experienced in the places she has visited and gotten to know. Plants and fruits also play an important role in Calero’s vocabulary and represent both nature itself and our idealized notion of its perfection.

The motifs are often transposed into abstract patterns and combined with simple building materials referencing architectonic elements. Mosaics, corrugated plastic, and latticework can be found in Calero’s paintings as well as in her installations. Both practices are closely interwoven in her work. As such, Calero organizes her spatial scenarios as if they were pictures. In exhibition situations, the paintings in turn interact with colorfully painted walls.

Calero’s playful approach belies extensive art-historical and cultural knowledge, which pervades her entire oeuvre in a broad spectrum of references. Her work is an expedition that raises questions about inclusion and exclusion and reminds us of the familiar iconography of Tropicália.