In «Urabá,»
Ricardo Gutiérrez Pays Homage To Home
The eye looks straight out at the viewer, open and unblinking as gold and teal paint spread over the frame. On one side, a hummingbird lifts her blue-green wings and extends a thin, forked tongue. On the other, an Anolis dracula lizard scampers onto a clump of rocks. His scales glow an iridescent green. In the canvases around him, red-orange hibiscus flowers burst into bloom.
For artist Ricardo Gutiérrez, it feels like home.
Gutiérrez is a painter and photographer who is working to grow his footprint across New Haven, while using vignettes from his native Colombia as his backdrop. After presenting Urabá: The Promised Land last weekend in North Haven, he is hoping to bring his work to venues in New Haven, as well as New York and internationally. He currently practices out of a home studio in New Haven’s Edgewood neighborhood.
«When I’m painting, I’m meditating,” he said Friday, surrounded by his work in a gallery that sits above a meat market on Middletown Avenue. “It feels good doing that. I’m so proud to be Colombian. I’m so proud to show my culture to the world.»