carolyn castaño

Color Ritmo ( Red and black)
^{Waterolor, gouache on watercolor paper}
Ruana Interruption ( La W) Watercolor, gouache on watercolor paper

Tropical Geometries
painting, works on paper
2018











Ruana Interruption (Red and gold)
Watercolor, gouache on watercolor paper mounted on plexi


Ruana Interruption ( Pink and Magenta) Watercolor, gouache on watercolor paper mounted on plexi



Ruana Interruption ( Orange and Blue)Watercolor, gouache on watercolor paper




Ruana Interruption ( Purple and Gold)
Watercolor, gouache on watercolor paper mounted on plexiglass

In Tropical Geometries, landscape and pattern are used to re-imagine ideas of modernity, progress, and identity in the Americas. Landscape painting, mapping, cartography, and botanical illustration co-exist simultaneously in these works with patterns and free-flowing shapes inspired by Pre-Columbian and indigenous textiles, such those of the Wayuu in Colombia. At the same time, elements of Neo-Concrete painting and 20th Century graphic design interrupt our contemplation of what some might see as a sublime, prelapsarian natural world by interjecting, fracturing, and bifurcating the visual conventions of the "landscape." By putting abstractions and patterns on the same plane as traditionally painted landscapes I hope to not just capture the historical simultaneity of cultures and ecosystems, but also a sense of their possible futures