JOSE SIERRA

REPRESENTED ARTIST

Jose Sierra (b. 1991 in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia) obtained his Master in Fine Arts from the University Institute of Fine Arts and Science of Bolivar (UNIBAC) in 2012 with a body of work titled Anti-Personnel Grids, which has since exhibited in different locales of Colombia. Shortly after, he was commissioned by the Colombian Ministry of Culture alongside the artist collective Si Nos Pagan Boys to participate in an urban art exposition titled, La Muerte Se Va de Vacaciones (Death is Going on Vacation) that was executed as a reaction to the traditionalism of Cartagena. In 2014, he exhibited at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Cartagena and in La Presentacion Casa Museo Arte y Cultura. He then exhibited in the Cultural Center Ciudad Movil in 2016 with a body of work created in collaboration with the Colombian photographer, Camo. In the same year, he was nominated for the International Luxembourg Art Prize for his recent work Self-Portrait. Sierra’s ongoing body of work continues to be based around his self-representation from which he addresses a homoerotic gaze through the configuration of abject staged environments that he merges himself within as “a subject of aesthetic creation.”

ARTWORK

Cuerpo en Tensión Series

El Envuelto Divino Series

Deseo Insular Series

There artist was enchanted by some images he had a relationship with since childhood, working them into iconographies, such as the image of the fisherman carrying on his back a cod almost its size, this composition is complemented with the use of a milky remedy the old fashion multivitamin “Scott emulsion”. These iconic elements he grew up with, in the decade of the '90s, still exist and are a source of resonance, suggesting the artist thanks the location where he twisted up this series. The "Insular Desire" is a reversion to his past. Sierra’s ongoing body of work continues to be based around his self-representation from which he addresses a homoerotic gaze through the configuration of abject staged environments that he merges himself within as “a subject of aesthetic creation.

La Costilla Roja Series

This work is the result of an artistic residence outside his "study”.The artist worked on a different ecosystem, a house of vernacular architecture built in 1913 in the department of Huila, Colombia. It is important to highlight the practice session of watching over and recording each detail of this space to get a correct reading between the aesthetics of the place and the body.

Sin Titulo Series

Body Paint tribute to the Afro and pre-Columbian cultures, taking erotic and suggestive poses such as reading among others.

Showing a body that is hidden is the aesthetic apology for the insane judgment that the artist himself has taken as an excuse for not being "pointed at" or rather as self-pointing. The stone is taken by the body that is unprotected as a metaphor for the weakness that seeks protection, and the body is taken by the stone as a consequence of an insecure state, how can a stone take a body? If this is the one that "institutionally" does it.

La Piedra Sustituta I Series