VICTOR QUINTANILLA EXHIBITION RE-OPENING

Monday, June 1, 2020 - 09:46

The Gibraltar Cultural Services re-opened the Victor Quintanilla ‘Cosmos’ sculpture exhibition on the 26th of May at the GEMA Gallery, Montagu Bastion. The exhibition, originally meant to launch in March, was closed off due to the Coronavirus lockdown. The sudden re-opening has come at the cost of the momentum the March opening had – it is the hope of the author that this piece will gain some traction towards bringing attention to this marvelous display of artistic skill and craftsmanship. Victor Quintanilla has worked with metal since his youth and creates sculptures from recycled material.

His exhibition, according to Cultural Services Gibraltar, “carries a universal message as he is influenced by worldly themes and the current climate”.

The exhibition is spaced into three rooms; each room with its particular thematic and symbolic sign-ificance(s). It is imperative to emphasise that Victor Quintanilla directed the positioning and of work within the museum, a positioning which itself engages the viewer in a dialogue with the art as it was “meant” to be seen. Thus, as we enter the first room of the exhibition we confront the first metallic sculpture: a clown playing an accordion next to a matador. Both immediately set the scene for the rest of the gallery.

The clown’s arcs and bends, made from an array of spoons and similar material mark a striking contrast to the matador’s angular features – his firm and slender frame set against a gawkish bulk of orbicular metals. The room’s main piece was, however, the colorful band of ‘Payasos’ who unlike their stocky cousin were less crouched and more upright: proud of their profession. The colours, framed by the grey-steel of the usual sculptures proved eye-catching and successfully elevated the jovial mood the metallic group were perhaps meant to bring. An assortment of other pieces decorated the room, once more allowing visitors to settle their eyes to the aesthetic stylings of Quintanilla’s impressive array of abstract, detailed, and surreal images.

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01-06-2020 PANORAMAdailyGIBRALTAR