Stubborn, passionate, vulnerable and imaginative. This is how Montse Gallego describes herself. The Spanish artist, based in London for sixteen years, is going to leave the direction of her personal project: Hundred Years Gallery, a cosy cultural and exhibition space located in the heart of Shoreditch. She is leaving for a sabbatical period and wants to bring back to her homage to García Márquez whose ‘magic spirit’ inspired the name of the gallery and still hovers around the gallery space.
Montse’s fascination with García Márquez started when she was just 14 and read ‘Ojos de Perro Azul’, a very short story happening within a dream by two strangers who are looking for each other. These types of worlds were in Montse’s experiences since she was a child, and have been developed throughout her career as an artist in many different forms, always inspired by the familiar tradition of recounting dreams during breakfast. Her work has always been marked by the power of the symbol and the prominence of the written word. “When I’m painting I’m also writing,” Gallego says.
Following in the tradition of the Magical Realism of Gabriel García Márquez, the works in this show date from the early 1990s to 2011, just prior to the founding of Hundred Years Gallery where Montse Gallego has been Director for the past six.
M. Gallego : ‘Ojos de Perro Azul’.
19th October to 12th November
Hundred Years Gallery
www.hundredyearsgallery.co.uk/
More about Montse Gallego at Brit Es: http://www.britesmag.com/montse-gallego-the-art-world-needs-a-reflexion/
Image © ‘Perro Azul’ by Montse Gallego