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Through generations, New York city has attracted millions of immigrants for everything the city has to offer, at a personal, cultural or professional level. With its lively night life, the memories kept by each of its corners, and with the possibility to reach a goal, no wonder the city has the reputation of being the most exciting place in the world. And yet, for the Mexican artist Aurelio del Muro Balandran, to live in New York, with its unlimited number of distractions, is as much a pleasure as it is a disadvantage.
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. . I think that the creative act does not have control when you
let go . . .
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"To be an artist in New York is very difficult," says Aurelio, who at 45, has spent more than half of his life in the city. "Everything distracts you. When I try to concentrate something happens." Just at the moment he is ready to begin laboring in one of his works, says Aurelio, somebody calls, or just realizes of a great concert, or a friend stops by to ask him out for a beer. Maybe this is the reason why, that by leaving the hustle and bustle of New York for five months to travel in Europe, Aurelio was able toofind the solitude and the concentration necessary to create the works that he displayed in an exhibition at the Art Student's League from the 9th to the 26th of November. The trip took place after Aurelio won the McDowell award, which provides money to artists to travel throughout Europe in search for inspiration for their art. Aurelio found it in Portugal, Italy, Paris and Seville. The current show at the League, entitled Travel, Memory, and Sculpture, is an outcome of this trip to Europe. This is the second time that Aurelio has had a one-person show in New York. A previous exhibition took place in the mid-nineties at the Mexican Cultural Institute of New York where he showed work that engaged his personal form of abstraction. In the current show at the Art Student's League, Aurelio has shown sculptures of "feet" in all manners of form and positions, inspired by places like Seville, as well as, by the work of Picasso. Also on display are drawings of what he saw in Europe, with a written narrative, typed in a long roll of tracing paper whereas he gives an account of the memories of his trip. What pushed the exhibition was to share the visual expression of his trip to the public in New York and to transmit the emotions of his experiences abroad. And yet, being wherever he may be, in New York, Mexico, or Europe, the pleasure that Aurelio takes from making art is the same. "I think that the creative act does not have control when you let go," says Aurelio. "This is the miracle of the creative mind." |
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Aurelio del Muro Balandran won the Art Students League's McDowell Grant in 2004 and used the funds to tour Porrtugal , Spain, Paris and Italy the following Spring. A native of Mexico, Aurelio arrived in New York in 1978. He took his first sculpture class in 1983, studying with Tom Doyle, adn he earned a B.A. in psychology at Queens College in 1985. Aurelio has worked as a counselor and social worker. He now teaches English literacy at Cl College and is a janitor at the League while pursuing his artistic goals. |
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. . This is the miracle of the creative mind . . .
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| At the League, Aurelio first studied with Barney Hodes; his principal teacher/mentor was Philip Pavia. Hiw work has been exhibited in a one-man show at the Mexican Cultural Institute in New York and the White Box Gallery in Philadelphia. Mexico and his friends, as well as what he terms "a slow by steady revelation of life, art and the sculptural," inspire his carved pieces. |
by Ana
Maria Toro © 2006
November 2006 Reprinted from Art |
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2004 Recipient of the McDowell Travel Grant The Harriman
Gallery |
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The Sculptures of Aurielo del Muro Balandran is on exhibition at the Art Students League of New York, from November 9 through 26, 2006. Hours of exhibition: Monday to Friday 9am-8:30pm, Saturdays and Sundays from 9am-5pm. |