Rene Vasquez - Beauty is an act of rebellion

Gallery

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This is from a series of works on wood panels by Rene Vasquez, done in 2018. Though this artist comes from a primarily Mexican background, he was raised in Southern California. The work is very suggestive of the magical realism of a Leonora Carrington, or Remedios Varo. His work has alot of the precision, technical mastery, and conceptual brilliance displayed by both of those outstanding Latin Masters.

"This is from a recent series of works on wood panels by Rene Vasquez. Though this artist comes from a primarily Mexican background, he was raised in Southern California. The work is very suggestive of the magical realism of a Leonora Carrington, or Remedios Varo. His work has alot of the precision, technical mastery, and conceptual brilliance displayed by both of those outstanding Latin Masters.

The following is a quote of Vasquez, which offers some insight into this exquisite body of work. "I am a self-confessed narcissist, and agnostic, though I long to find God and to be less self consumed. In my work I have gone all the way from the pursuit of poetry and beauty, to the ugliness and terror wrought by the desire of man. I have come to the point where I believe there is one pervasive theme and urgency facing man, or more specifically men. That is the ongoing femenization and the effort to strip men, of his masculine role in the world.

These paintings depict myself as I seek the base origin of this masculine nature. I confess I am a sucker for beautiful woman, and much of history seems to stem from the pursuit of beauty and pleasure. It seems like the amount of destruction caused by this pursuit, is in direct proportion to the nature and extent of an individuals particular fetish and obsession. 
In my case, as I stated earlier, it is the desire to possess beauty, and to be surrounded by it. While still a youth a theory occurred to me, that in order to possess beauty, I had to mimic it.

I have since come to realize that beauty must be a form of power. I am in the process of resolving, and working on my own deprogramming, in order to return to the source of my own being, and in order to become a more realized man. It seems to be a process of evolving past stupidity, failure, and self abuse, perhaps by developing more self control? I am born naked and bound to the earth with my eyes on the heavens and dreams of immortality. I need to be broken, of so many of my misconceptions. I need to free myself from my tangle of the undergrowth. 
My wife tells me I am an oaf and a chauvinist but throws herself at me in the same breath. I know I am on to something."