Carlos Sagrera

Carlos Sagrera graduated for his Fine Arts study in 2011. The main subject in the work of this young Spanish painter are interiors; different spaces of a home in which time seems to have stood still. The spaces evoke associations with the past and as a spectator you wonder if the interiors really existed, or if they are merely created by the artist.
We might recognize the depicted furniture and objects from the fifties and sixties; the period in which the grandparents of Sagrera furnished their home, the home where the artist too lived during most of his childhood. Sagrera found old photos of when this house was new and ready to inhabit. He immediately saw something meaningful in the changes that had occurred over time, of what it looked like before he was born and what it looked like now, all these layers that had been added over time. This photo archive is the starting point for a series of paintings: pictorial representations interweaving the past and present. In his research of the evolution of these rooms he talks about generations, about the passing of time and about the habits and behavior in the private domain. At the same time it’s a way of keeping the memories of these interiors alive.

Sagrera is a big admirer of the Dutch seventeenth century painters and he interprets this period of art history in his very own contemporary way, making it hard to categorize him in a specific art-historical movement. The abstracted color sweeps are alternated by almost hyper-realistic details. This way the artist creates an intriguing tension between the materiality of the represented objects, of the paint itself and somewhat ethereal and impressionistic effects, much like a fading memory.
The passing of time, the wear and tear in the home, the collective and the personal memory, the history of art and the mystery of everyday life are typical themes of his work. Identity, alienation and the fading of memory are recurring topics of investigation.

After graduating from the academy in Spain he received a scholarship to work in the famous Spinnerei in Leipzig, Germany. Sagrera feels connected to the artists of the Leipziger Schule and is able to add his own interpretation of reality to this artistically rich environment.

Grants & prizes:

2017     Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation, Quebec, Canada.

2015 ‘2nd award’ ‘…and a thousand miles behind’ ArtWalk, Leipzig, Germany.

2014 ‘IV Encontros Artistas Novos’. Cidade da Cultura de Galicia. Spain.

2013 – 2012 Scholarship for Young Creators, Antonio Gala Foundation. Córdoba, Andalucía. Spain.

Collections:

Caldic collection, Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar, The Netherlands.

Hildebrand collection, Leipzig, Germany.

ING Collection, Th Netherlands.

Antonio Gala Foundation, Cordoba, Andalucía. Spain.

UEM Collection. (European University of Madrid). Madrid, Spain.

and other private collections.