Artist: Victoria Iranzo
Exhibition title: Ladybug
Venue: Galería Isabel Hurley, Malaga, Spain
Date: December 22, 2023 – February 2, 2024
Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artists and Galería Isabel Hurley, Malaga
A text by a painter for a painter
Tom Poelmans
Like any other painter Victoria is concerned with the image, the finished painting that serves as a substantial element in the painter’s practice. But before the final image is completed, there are different steps that have a unique way of order for the artist. And like any other painter there is no choice of whether or not to paint but about what to paint. Her studio is a place to find peace, to come to herself and to create. And it’s also full of colors, fabrics, oils, canvasses, drawings and all kinds of sketches. When I enter the studio a few objects immediately catches the eye, the dolls that are prominently present, standing high on a table and they look like mannequins. They have no face, no soul at first sight, but they are given their own character by the different dresses and garments, that are carefully made by the artist. Made with materials of certain colours and shapes so you can say that these dolls that originated from a childhood memory are immediately a subject that lends itself to painting, just because of the colors and the different textures they look like sculptures that comes from a painting, but it is actually the other way around, and when the dolls come to life she sees and she knows what she wants to paint.
In my opinion, the puppets are silent characters who follow Victoria in her process up to the final image, silent witnesses of a very controlled process. Characters who say nothing, can’t see, don’t judge, but are simply present in the silence of the studio where a fragile but confident process is going on. She also makes a complete background in gouache or oil, to give the puppets a world of their own. The backgrounds are painted on paper, these works are both functional and autonomous, just like the dolls they have something strange, they float somewhere between finished artwork and something functional, but if you look longer and attentively they are made in such a good way that they tend to be a separate work of art. Nevertheless, Victoria uses these backgrounds in combination with the puppets as a motif to take the final step towards the paintings. She searches for the right combination of figures and backgrounds through the lens of her camera, this image will eventually serve as a painting. So it’s an unique moment in the studio where everything works together towards a final painting. And afterwards each individual or object goes its own way, the puppets, the backgrounds, the paintings and the painter. The journey they make together ends with the exhibition.
The world she paints is transformed from an image she has created into something surreal. And one of the features of Iranzo’s paintings is the mastery with which she handles color. Each canvas is a symphony of hues, carefully chosen to evoke specific moods and resonate with the observer’s emotions. From the warm embrace of earthy tones of greens and browns to the ethereal play of pastels, Iranzo’s command over color is nothing short of awe-inspiring. It’s as if she speaks a language of pigments, translating the ineffable into a visual poetry that unfolds before our eyes.
Victoria invites viewers to explore the enigmatic landscapes and delve into the profound depths of the artist’s surreal atmosphere, the dolls, like silent actors in a theatrical production, contribute to the overall sense of ambiguity and introspection in here art. It is a complete process that becomes visible, a whole world that is created.
Victoria’s paintings are like traveling without moving.
