Dibujos de juventud

 

Mariano Aguilar Maluenda, Barcelona 1955. He has lived in Palma since 1988 and has dedicated his years to painting and teaching.

Moradas(Dwellings) assemble of 177 small-format oil paintings, mostly interiors.

"My painting goes hand in hand with what worries me in a moment in time. In this last time, due to real state speculation, my attention has benn focused on internet portals that include places, homes, rooms, interiors, with their furniture and objects. I portray what is about to disappear and treat the subject in an intimate and slightly nostalgic way."

Moradas:

For yeas I have walked at sunset. It distracts me to look at buildings, especially those with flats to rent, and try to guess how their interiors would look like; I've always wondered the same thing, what would my life be like if I lived there?

I scrutinize the Internet portals of real estate companies searching for a spacious place where to live the rest of my days. It is then when I see homes from other regions, where housing is less expensive, and I visit, mainly due to the limitation of my budget, the humblest houses. I am often surprised to see from the pictures of their interiors some revelations, that go beyond their informative purpose for wich they were made. They are houses without decoration. They exist for no other reason than survival.
Its inhabitants are no longer there, but they have left in their use, their experiences and their spirit attached to the walls. Belongings that speak for themselves, by their placement, by the way of being grouped that was often done in a hasty way.

Oh, how much I know of these houses without ever been there! How full of signs are its corners, its corridors, bedrooms, kitchens, basements, attics, full of true meanings, wich go beyond their mere contemplation becoming a universe of trapped experiences that send me back to other spaces, places times, ages, people, friends and family. Many of them already disappeared.
This evocative power is largely due to its similarity to some inhabited and lived by me.
Difficult to be paint without reliving the pain. However, others seemed as if I had inhabited them. To enter them, that is, to paint them, was to live them again and thus meet their inhabitants. It's like painting a collection of portraits, next to my own.

Mariano Aguilar "MORADAS" from MA Arte Contemporáneo on Vimeo.