b-guided > Barcelona

Anthony Goicolea. Domesticated

04.07.12
  • Concave, 2012. Acrylic on paper, 132 x 92 cm.

  • Camouflage, 2012. Acrylic on paper, 203 x 106 cm.

Anthony Goicolea (Atlanta, 1971, lives and works in Brooklyn, New York) is an American artist with Cuban roots, his exhibition Domesticated is made up of a studied selection of photographs, videos and works on paper and wood. The pieces investigate the search for the limits between the domesticated and the untamed, a reflection on the intervention of man within nature.
Several scenarios that form modern vanitas (still lives), creating a metaphorical compass between life, permanence, creation and decomposition. Whether  it be through sceneries created by man or nature Goicolea refrains from denouncing the planet’s vanity nor does he moralise on mundane pleasures but rather considers the social mechanisms and illustrates how animals and people are immersed in the processes of death and regeneration. Some of the works are inhabited by characters like wild dogs, potted domestic plants or legendary creatures like Big Foot or Sasquatch. These images are sourced equally from an wild and mysterious nature as much as manicured man made constructs. In part, 'Domesticated' brings us back to a primordial condition of these things to a place free from the dominance of civilisation.