Feb '06 -Art Arco Exhibition in Madrid

Last week I travelled to Madrid for Art Arco which ran from Feb 09-Feb 13, 2006. There were a total of 250 galleries from around the world featuring Avant-garde, Modern, Contemporary, Emerging, and Experimental art, exhibiting a wide range of works, including sculpture, installation, video, editions, drawings, new media art, and photography. Some of the work was not too my taste, some was fabulous and some pieces were thought provoking, one piece in particular was disturbing. The piece was an installation with video technology. People were invited on to an actual aeroplane, which was sited outside of the two exhibition halls, once onboard they were handed a scalpel and pair of latex gloves and then were greeted by an image of a totally nude woman, who engaged in a conversation with them before asking them to cut her using the scalpel. The whole process was being filmed. This in itself was shocking, why anyone would want to cut another person, why would someone want to film it and why was there no notice before boarding the plane to warn of what was in store; young children were boarding the plane! It is not new, one female performance artist, exhibited herself, totally nude in a London gallery and offered the viewers a selection of items to inflict pain on her body in any way they saw fit, to what purpose I am not sure, but she did get a lot of publicity!!!

The Fusion Gallery does not exhibit this sort of controversial art, but does show art from around the world and this month we do feature nudes, from three new artists to the Fusion Gallery stable. Eric Zilverberg, a Dutch artist who paints beautiful nudes using a vibrant colour palette and Luis Frutos, a Spanish artist based in Altea whose paintings are rich with textures and thick with glazes which he uses with such efficiency. Rickey Jansen is a Dutch sculptor, whose work is beautiful and delicate, producing bronze pieces in the female form.

Please call in to the Gallery to view the new works, you will not be greeted by a naked female, but you will be greeted by a warm smile….