Global Village The News ē friday june 5, 2015 ē MEXICO CITY
Highest reality
Year 6!Number 288!8 pages
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Spanish wines showcased Iberian vintners present more than 150 labels from across that country PAGE: 7
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ANZACS HONORED Australians and New Zealanders remember fallen heroes
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PHOTOS COURTESY OF CHRISTIAN BORBOLLA
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Vaccinations are not just for kids Keeping everyone’s shots up to date can help prevent epidemics PAGE: 8
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For inspiration, Mexican hyperrealist painter Christian Borbolla draws from both the past and the present, to augment reality through compositions that awaken the spirit. Borbolla creates intricate and expressively detailed canvases from live models and a finely tuned language of symbolism. The News caught up with him in his Condesa studio. “Hyperrealism is about taking reality to its highest expression,” Borbolla said. “The most important characteristic is developing the detail, developing every part of the canvas.” Hyperrealism came out of photorealism, which, as the name suggests, sought to elevate painting to the level of a photograph. Photorealism developed during the second half of the 20th century as a reaction to modernism and conceptualism, which stripped classicism of its formality, layer by layer. Hyperrealism seeks to go beyond photorealism, to be even more precise than a photograph, emphasizing details that the camera fails to capture. Hyperrealists like Borbolla even invent details in order to make their subjects more luscious. Hyperrealism is delicious for the eyes. “Reality is a vehicle of expression,” Borbolla said. “I start to input elements in the work that have to do with my style and the whole story I want to tell. It obligates the spectator to fixate on what I want them to fixate on.” Borbolla takes the “hyper” part of hyperrealism to a new level, adding an extra element. Rather than working purely from single photographs, he creates compositions using iconography and symbolism to compose spiritual narratives. Rather than abstract reality, the painter uses reality to make subtle suggestions toward higher concepts than can be alluded in photographs. One of the enduring qualities in Borbolla’s work Global Culture
is that it’s disconnected from the limited dialogue that exists within the formal art world. He is a self-taught artist who was sure about what he wanted to do with his life. Without the requirements of the contemporary art world weighing him down, he said he is free to express whichever ideas suit him. “I was never interested in studying art in a formal way.” Borbolla said. “But I looked for the best teachers in the different mediums, so that I could master them myself. Since childhood, I knew I was going to be a painter. My parents always took me to museums and told me about art history. It was very easy to choose my career.” After 20 years as a painter, Borbolla said he now has the technical ability to compose whatever he chooses. The narratives in his work are centered around spirituality and ancient mysticism. Using “all of the most ancient spirituality that is the basis for religion today,” he said he creates a hybrid, democratic spirituality. “I manage an iconography,” Borbolla said. “The personality that appears in the work is what unites all of the symbolism. The basis for all of my compositions is sacred geometry. All of the proportions and the placement of the elements is all planned out.” Borbolla has gathered much of his inspiration from traveling and living around the world. After growing up in Oaxaca, he lived in the United States, Spain and France before settling in Mexico City almost four years ago. The narrative of his paintings has developed to reflect his experiences, he said. “In the end, I think it is important to leave your own fingerprints behind,” Borbolla said. “There are so many paintings in the world and people will continue to make paintings. What has value is your individual story.” Borbolla said that in straight hyperrealism, there is a lot of work and beauty, but not much personal expression.
“I like to pull various symbols from different sources to create my own story,” he said. The symbolism that Borbolla uses calls on the plethora of information available today and also the technique of appropriation. Even though he is using the most classical tools, oil paint and brushes, and ancient symbolism, the painter creates images that are securely situated in today’s society. One of the paintings in his studio is a portrait of Mexico City Mayor Miguel Ángel Mancera. The painting is layered with symbolism derived from an incident that occurred when Mancera was Mexico City attorney general, when he personally dealt with a hostage situation that resulted in 52 children being released, Borbolla said. However, it isn’t a portrait of Mancera as a hero. Rather, the painting portrays him in dramatic lighting with a wry smile on his face, as if the controversial mayor hovers between light and dark. The symbolism isn’t apparent at first – you have to look for it, etched into the background of the portrait. But on closer investigation, the painting reveals itself. Borbolla said he strives to express a conceptual profundity within the beauty and labor of his technique. His paintings conceal countless hours of patient, meditative work. There is something almost sadistic about hyperrealism, in today’s world of mass production, he said. The meditative nature of Borbolla’s work sometimes seems to give rise to subconscious ideas that materialize on the canvas. “The meditation of working, gives me an inner tranquility,” Borbolla said. “For two years, I have been putting walls in the background of all my paintings, but all the walls have cracks. I suppose it represents the passage of time and change. But I was back in Oaxaca and I noticed that the majority of the downtown buildings have these adobe walls that are cracked from time. So, that’s where it came from, my childhood.”
PHOTOS COURTESY OF CHRISTIAN BORBOLLA
BY DEVON VAN HOUTEN MALDONADO
The News
Christian Borbolla
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Christian Borbolla’s paintings can be seen at the Alberto Misrachi Gallery in Mexico City, located at Campos Elíseos 215, local E, in Colonia Polanco and at the Corsica Gallery in Puerto Vallarta and Los Cabos.