Gerardo Monterrubio

 This Weeks featured Artist is Gerardo Monterrubio.

 Gerardo's work primarily consists of porcelain ceramic sculpture. 

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Gerardo's work is unique because he uses the smooth quality of the porcelain as a neutral ground to draw on. The technique of drawing on a three dimensional surface gives the work a dynamic spacial presence, and fascinating detail. 

Gerardo not only uses three dimensional form to create an interesting interplay between the drawings on top of it, but also to add meaning to the work. The use of recognizable form in Gerardo's work, such as a the human bust in the picture above, gives the drawings an extra dimension of meaning and significance, and interpretation.

Gerardo's work sometimes has graphic qualities that are highly stylized. The use of composite drawing, along with the shifting planes which further distort the drawing, give the work a dream like and surrealist quality.

Much of Gerardo's work deals with many social issues that plague different cultures. Gerardo is able to successfully comment on these issues through his use of both the form of the ceramic itself and the images drawn on top.

Gerardo states this about his work, "For millennia, numerous cultures have used the ceramic medium to record their existence. From these artifacts, we can form an understanding and various interpretations of such societies, speculating on their cultural paradigms, political and social practices, mythologies, and the human experience of the worlds that created them.

It is this anthropological aspect that propels my work in its creative endeavor, using the forms as vehicles to compose linear and fragmented narratives. Altered by the imagination, memory, and the like, my work engages the idea of recording selected aspects of contemporary society, in methods that are ancient and universal as human creativity itself."

Gerardo's latest work deviates from the usually polished forms present in his earlier work. He begins using rough edges and texture to achieve an almost painterly quality. This is further accentuated by his use of color.

Some of Gerardo's work will be on display at the Biola University Art Gallery from
January 26 - February 13, 2015.