'Happy weekend drawings', Aggtelek
Artist: Aggtelek
Fechas: November 18th 2023 to January 12th 2024
Driven by the cravings of Vallès’ and Perales’ unlimited visual appetite, the works in Aggtelek remind us of the typical menu in an international fast-food chain: an exact X-ray of the time in which the artists are living. Hence their work is a facsimile of the capitalist system we inhabit, in which the only aim is to produce and produce and produce. They apply their own humorous perspective to their representation of capitalism, and often on a grandiose scale (their works and projects are often series consisting of 300 to 500 drawings).
Aggtelek considers art as a creative process, an experiment and an experience. Its body of work can be summed up as “an autobiography of our ideas”.
Vallès and Perales first attracted attention with their giant cardboard sculptures and hyper-fast videos where they created and destroyed sculptures with their bodies. These were followed by their Name Paintings, in which they captured the essence of contemporary art, painting on huge 2m x 2m canvases the names of people that in themselves are a visual and narrative story. Or how about their renowned “Restaurante Palacio Feliz”, where they used cardboard boxes and drawings on paper and tape to recreate an authentic Chinese restaurant in a museum, serving delicious noodles in what they described as a “living sculpture” where people could go to eat and hang out.
Their work is characterised by its humour, bright colours and “Happy Conceptual Meal” vibe, as well as the artists’ desire to develop series in which they can experiment, investigate and create new ideas that affect us in an expansive, obsessive way.
Their “Second Hand” series arose from asking themselves “What’s the worst thing a contemporary artist can do?”, to which their answer was “Copy others”.
So that’s exactly what they did: copy works by other artists, using markers bought in the bazaar next to their house and giving them new meanings.
Or the magnificent series entitled “One Second Paintings”, dreamt up from the phrase:
“Attendees of art fairs look at each work for one second, so we’re going to create a series of paintings that have taken us one second.”
And that’s what they did.
After becoming parents and realising that they couldn’t continue to create at the pace they had done previously, they created the “Notebook Paintings” series: a series of paintings in which they wrote down all the ideas they have but can’t turn into reality, the books they want to read but don’t have time for, ideas for future exhibitions or things they want to see but can’t.
Their “Historia del Arte” series (300 drawings) is the history of art as depicted through the genitals of artists from Praxiteles to Damien Hirst, while their “Weekend Drawings” series includes pictures drawn by the whole family (there are four of them) at the weekends. Topics range from drawings of abstract lines in fat marker, to a jar of Tabasco, to palm trees, to faces in the style of Picasso, motivational phrases or kawaii dogs. A huge archive of drawings stemming from family conversations. Currently the series consists of about 600 drawings, and it continues to grow.
Using humour and a healthy dose of colour, Aggtelek’s works are a reflection of the world we were born into.
Since 2004 Vallès and Perales have held solo exhibitions in various galleries including Ponce+Robles (Madrid), Exile (Berlin), House of Chappaz (Barcelona), Hilary Crisp (London), ShauOrt (Zurich), Galerie Adler (Frankfurt), Luis Adelantado (Miami, Valencia, Mexico), Jozsa Gallery (Brussels) and Videospace (Budapest). They have also been involved in individual projects outside the commercial circuit such as the Fundació Antoni Tàpies (Barcelona), L’Autonomie and the Instituto Cervantes (Brussels) and Incident Report (Hudson, NY).
They have also participated in group exhibitions including “Beelden op het Vrijthof” (Museum Vrijthof, Maastricht, 2013), “L’Art Est Un Sport de Combat” (Musée des-Beaux-Arts de Calais, 2011), “There is so much beauty it can make you cry” (Exile, Berlin 2011), the 2nd Rennes Biennial (2010), the 10th Istanbul Biennial (2007), “Remote Viewing” (2009, MOCA, Los Angeles), “Solo al Buio. DEPART Collection” (Mercato di Traiano, 2008, Rome), “Zomerzone” (Museum Het Domein, Sittard, The Netherlands 2008) and “La Noche en Blanco” (Madrid 2007).
Among the accolades for Aggtelek’s work are the Beers Lambert Award for Emerging Art (London 2013) and first prize in the V Certamen de Pintura de Castellón (2008). In addition, the entire “Historia del Arte” series was recently acquired by the Museo de Arte de Cerdanyola.