?Asepsic Power? art show opens at Image Factory
A new art show opened over the weekend at the Image Factory in Belize City featuring the work of conceptual Honduran artist Adan Valencillo. The exhibition is called “Asepsic Power” and according to curator Gilvano Swasey, is sure to provoke a lot of thought. Swasey says the idea is to shake up the norm.
Gilvano Swasey Curator, Image Factory
?Traditionally as artists in Belize and basically the audience, we are used to realism. A coconut tree, a bridge, a bird. Things that we call touristic stuff, things that do not really force us to think because they are right outside. And we have always had that problem, where we are only satisfied with what we know.?
?What he does is take the very aspects of things, the realistic aspects of things like the trees, which is real and natural and pure and so forth and add what we humans think is so good, the plastic, the metal and so forth that has no life, yes, development, nature versus development, capitalism, consumerism and he adds them together and he forces you to think: this is what we?ve got that?s good, and this is what we think is good, when we put them together and how do they match??
?He has a nice selection and installation of spoons. When you think of spoon, you think of picking up something and putting it in your mouth and consuming. But what he does, he has the spoon consuming you, because actually the spoon is filled with teeth. So instead of us eating, the spoon is eating us, which is a very interesting thing to look at. When it comes to consumerism, many of us think that we have the power to buy or basically we are the one in charge to pick things, but that is totally not true.
We are the ones being bought and sold. We are bombarded by all these things we think we want them and we don?t want them.?
The exhibition runs for one month at the Image Factory. Adan Vallencillo’s work was part of a group show featuring other Honduran artists calling themselves La Cuarteria at the Image Factory back in 2004.
