ART

Wiegand Gallery presents Eduardo Carrillo: Within a Cultural Context. The exhibition will be comprised of approximately 30 oil paintings and watercolors spanning four decades of the artist’s life. There will be a discussion of Eduardo Carrillo’s life and work with Alison Carrillo, Betsy Andersen, Director of the Museo Eduardo Carrillo and Robert Poplack, Wiegand Gallery Director.

Eduardo Carrillo is best known for large mural-sized paintings inspired by his ancestral Mexican heritage with an emphasis on figurative work. Mythology, Spanish Colonial history, and Baroque art are historical touchstones which he uses in ironic ways to explore the dilemma of the American Hispanic artist. The exhibition also includes the more intimate side of Carrillo’s work with portraits, still lifes, and everyday scenes from his homes in California and Mexico. While living in La Paz, Mexico, Carrillo became more aware of Indian cultures.

A provocateur, Carrillo became part of the Royal Chicano Air Force in the 1970s, an arts group focused on social change. In 1972 he was offered a professorship at UC Santa Cruz and taught there until his death in 1997.

Carrillo’s large paintings are monumental with an immense physical presence. Bodies are muscular and beautiful in an archaic sense. His deep spiritual connection with people and the land are visible in the rendering of religious or mythological subjects. His distinctive palette seems muted at first, dominated by earth colors. Subtle placement of light conveys a serene and magical atmosphere. The watercolors and oil paintings of everyday life show the range of his ability and highlight an active mind always at work. Everything seems possible to paint. Landscapes, still lifes, figures and interiors were all subjects of interest and reveal an artist who was always looking and continually active.

The gifted painter and muralist enjoyed many solo exhibitions of his bold artwork in Mexico and Los Angeles before joining the faculty of the University of California Santa Cruz.