Cayo art exhibit features painting, sculpture

when we think of the art scene in Belize our minds usually focus on places like the Image Factory, Houses of Culture or the Mexican Cultural Centre. But since Good Friday the nation’s art capital has migrated seventy miles west to downtown San Ignacio. News Five’s Kendra Griffith reports that Shane Vasquez is not the only guy putting Cayo on the map.

Fernando Cruz, Painter
?Everybody seems to be showing what the rest of the districts have, but I want to bring the Cayo district back to being number one. I want to bring our people at the top and let us show our crafts and our skills to the rest of Belize.?

Kendra Griffith, Reporting
And to showcase that talent, this month artist Fernando Cruz is holding his third local exhibition. The show is aptly titled: Something Old … Something New … Someone Borrowed … Some Wood Too.

Fernando Cruz
?Some of the work that I have here had been shown last year, some of the work I?ve done a long time ago when I was residing in the U.K. The portraiture that you see here was first exhibited in Belize in 1999. Some of the work is new that has been just created within the last few months I?ve been in Belize. The borrowed person is Mr. Alfonso Galvez, who I guess you will be speaking to in a bit, and the wood is actually his creation, the sculptures.?

One of Cruz?s bigger pieces in the exhibition is his version of the well known ?Last Supper.? But instead of Jesus and the Disciples, Cruz uses historical figures such as Ghandi, Martin Luther King, Florence Nightingale, Bob Marley and even Evita Peron.

Fernando Cruz
?It might not be satisfactory to everybody, to everybody?s taste, but it?s a representation itself. It?s not a matter of saying it has to do anything with religion or against the church, this is an representation to give people at least somebody that they can identify with in this life.?

?If you notice what I?m trying to do here is actually taking people across from different continents. I did not want to take everybody from the Americas or everybody from the within Europe. This is a matter to actually cover cultures. But this painting here is not only to represent cultures or say an image of the ?Last Supper?, this painting the reason behind it is to give women equality on the same table. That?s the point about, this is to put women to the same level as men.?

Cruz has more than art in common with his co-exhibitor Alfonso Galvez. They both are thirty-seven years old, and grew up and reside in San Ignacio. But for Galvez, the decision to become a sculptor was a spiritual awakening.

Alfonso Galvez, Sculptor
?I?ve been searching for a medium, which is not so strange in this world. It is called truth. The truth of our origin, where we are going, what we are doing here, why we came here. But that in a way makes my art secondary. For me artwork is not the primary reason; the primary reason is just answering the questions. But within the thought of a philosopher, you need at some point to exercise, you cannot just sit in a chair and meditate, it frustrates the individual, you need to go out and take a walk and relax the brain a little bit and so I decided that because I always loved wood, I decided that I wanted to start carving stuff out of wood.?

?I like to do physical things, I?m aggressive, you could say brutal, I want to sweat, I want to feel the energy flowing. The adrenaline must be there; I have that need for it and sculpturing offers me that brutal exertion. I can sweat, I can hack with a machete, I can chop with an axe, I can take a chainsaw and just chop off pieces, rip whatever. It makes me sound a little violent, but really I?m not.?

Galvez?s largest piece is The Banshee.

Alfonso Galvez
?As the name implies, an omen. For me it?s that spiritual aspect of women that enchants us men. … For some reason maybe at that point that I was producing this sculpture, maybe I was having some interactions with a woman and we were probably having clashes. I cannot remember how it comes about, but then I try to portray in this instance the dominant state of a woman in a man?s mind.?

And while most people may not understand, Galvez is okay with the fact that the audience may not get it.

Alfonso Galvez
?When a person can walk in and say I do not understand what you have here, for you can see it?s kinda surrealistic and abstract, but nonetheless they an actually say, I like it, that?s a good start. And I am please to see people say, I don?t understand it, but I like it.?

And whether you like wood or oil, Cruz invites everyone to come out and support art and artists.

Fernando Cruz
?There?s no charge here, come in, appreciate it, ask questions, make criticisms about it, it?s only healthy. And if you have anything that you want to inquire concerning prices or things like that, feel free to ask the artist, whether it?s myself or Mr. Galvez, because I think unless you get involved in it, unless you come in a see a part of it?look, we have a lot of talent in this country, but unless you come and appreciate it, this talent just feels like it?s being waste.?

Reporting for News Five, I am Kendra Griffith.

The exhibition runs through mid May at fourteen West Street in San Ignacio. Cruz hopes to host other exhibitions by Belizean artists.