Yago Hortal is a contemporary Spanish painter known for his vibrant paintings inspired by Abstract Expressionism. Born in Barcelona, Spain in 1983, Hortal has said: “I look for a balance between chaos and order, something like a combination between a chess game and a boxing match.” He manipulates the surface of his works by marbling, splattering, and smearing thick, fluorescent acrylic paint in an urgent, spontaneous manner. His paintings have an internal logic, in a similar manner to American artist Tomory Dodge. Having exhibited at Rooster Gallery in New York, Egbert Baque Cotnemporary Art in Berlin, and Espacio Atlantico in Vigo, among others
The color is the main protagonist of the painting that presents Hortal Iago at the beginning of the year in the gallery Senda. Vigorous strokes added to the use of saturated tones show a suggestive visual impact which have great harmony and boldness, multiple shades of color. The forms and combinations of this wide range span across the fabric, a process that culminates in the spread of the paint off the canvas, bursting into the architectural space. Thus, Hortal uses color as a vehicle to convey vitality and impetus to use pictorial masses contributing to the work severe expressive value, with a sculpture or relief.
The execution of the work gives the artist the ability to establish a relationship between chaos and control. This link is manifested by a directed to a natural ease contained, which encompass the clutter correspondence between the elements and the visual coherence of the composition. Use a variety of random shapes, waving and paintings jets to drive the route of looking around the canvas and provide a sense of movement to the representation. The transmission, as accurate, gestures to the fabric, and perceptible evidence of the working method of execution attributes are neat, in an abstract way to express that combines spontaneity with the rational through a formal vocabulary covered suggestive in a large domain of pictorial resources.
Galería Senda (Booth 9 F08)
The exhibition ‘H-H. Halley meets Hortal’ has come together after eight months of conversations, e-mail exchanges, and the cross-posting of ideas, studies, and drafts in which both artists responded to each other’s practice.
This led to conversations about things they have in common — and others that differentiate them — inside the world of abstract painting. It highlights the New Yorker and the Catalan, experience and youth, rationalism and randomness, geometry and gesture, two approaches to the mastery of color… a back and forth dialogue about what unites them and what distances them.
At Senda, each artist will exhibit three large paintings, conceived of with the goal of establishing a conversation. In addition, Peter Halley and Yago Hortal have created five collaborative works on paper, signed by both artists.
