He Calls Me Diablo / Maikel Dominguez

Galleri Duerr är glad att välkomna tillbaka den kubansk-amerikanska konstnären Maikel Dominguez med sin soloutställning He Calls Me Diablo, med några verk från utställningen Rosa Pájaro som öppnade nyligen på The Laundromat Art Space i Miami.

Maikel studerade på Konstfack 2013 när vi träffades första gången, vilket ledde till ett samarbete och hans första solo utställning utanför Kuba i vårt galleri som då låg på Vanadisvägen. Född 1989 i Holguin, Kuba, har Maikel en B.F.A. från University of Arts (ISA) i Havanna och har studerat vid Konstfack i Stockholm samt Academy of Fine Arts El Alba i Holguin och bor och arbetar idag i Miami, Florida.

Utställningen öppnade den 12 mars och är förlängd pga Corona tills den 31 juli 2020. Kontakta Galleri Duerr för visningar.

Se denna korta film om utställningen.

Reflektioner om Maikels verk av konstkritiker Rubens Riol:
Rosa Pájaro, a solo exhibition by the young Cuban painter Maikel Domínguez, is more than just a capricious title ... seeming to be the ultimate reaffirmation of the stereotype, a manifesto about the color of his palette and gender identity, with the emphasis of which he transforms alleged weaknesses into a claim of dignity and of pride in a boutique shell. But the most disconcerting thing behind that dressing room activism is the certainty of an expectant, hunting manhood; crouched in the disguise of the ambiguous, in a fulminating androgyny that knows of breaks and victories.

The pink color in his work is no longer associated with the ethereal, the sweet and the pleasant, but with the feelings of nonconformity, pain and anguish. It is clear that Domínguez's speech does not emulate with Edith Piaf's famous song (sweetener, optimist and romantic), but, on the contrary, with old victrola cries that evoke penalties of love and existential tears. Hence, its monochromatic pieces form a narrow cosmos, where pink symbolises — at the same time — resurrection and martyrdom, euphoria and fatigue, confession and secrecy, revenge and fatigue, salvation and tragedy, escape and confinement.

Konstnären Maikel Dominguez uttalande
My work is a process, a mental state through which I search and find happiness.

To me art is an instrument with which I can do magic, generate my own reality and establish a direct connection between each individual's physical and spiritual world. I believe artistic creation must be rewarding and healing for the artist, only then can he offer the Object-Art as knowledge and experience.

My search is focused in the creation of a universe ruled by balance. The results are fragments, narrations of a bittersweet world, full of contrasts and cynics; pastel atmospheres where my characters find relief. In any case I draw on the idea of sacrifice and pain, not from the perspective of the quiet observer that delights himself in the anatomy of the maimed body but from that of who encourages and supports what was already dead.

I give myself to painting out of pleasure and without fight. We are born with great certainties: pain, suffering and death. Pleasure, joy and happiness are not assured. So I find no greater virtue than to pursuit them. I have found the way, the relief in the worst of times, behind the darker thoughts there will be always the infinite possibility of surrender, revel in the senses.

The greatest vertigo is caused by the open door of a room where someone awaits for you, there to surrender, soft and meek, observant of your desires, waiting in chills to be surprised and carried, blindfolded, to the worst of places; a place where god is nude and isn't afraid to reveal itself. In that room where you rule and are obeyed you are happy at a reasonable price: the perfect equilibrium. Only there you will be god and slave, king and servant. The vertigo has no other reason than uncertainty and the monster you carry within twirls because it knows you are about to drink the antidote or the poison.