Gabriela Martinez

Gabriela A. Martínez has been drawn to the practice of arts since a young age; nevertheless, it was during the time she studied at the National Academy of Arts “San Alejandro” that she approached her plastic orientation towards the language of abstraction. She graduated in Painting in 2012, when she found in abstraction the most suitable means to canalize a range of concerns about the world that surrounded her, and at the same time it offered her a space in which she felt she could create a dialogue with the earlier history of art, particularly with abstract expressionism.

Without a doubt, the artist’s spontaneity, the dominant gestural stroke and the significant subjective and free expression of the subconscious in her works, were the essence that guided her to the practice of abstraction. The artist has called her art as “therapeutic” where she reflects her past, her family background and her different moods, which becomes into deep self-contemplation, own burden and meditative dimension.

The almost tangible and intimate virtue is greatly expressed in Gabriela’s abstract work. The canvases not only embrace the materials that once contributed to the appeased of Cuban art during the seventies (acrylic, asphalt, cement, wood, oil, dumping material, metal), but also includes hair, fluids and prints of the artist during her process of creation. The filling in her compositions, the thickness of her brushstroke and the drama of the colors highlights in pieces such as The two Chinese or Area 51.

Therefore, her preference for large formats brings out captivating moving landscapes, which are not far from the German neo-expressionism tradition of the 80’s. In other of her works like “Si te doy duro no me digas nada” it is remarkable the (Rauschenbergiana) blend from the intuitive and emotional elements along with certain embodied conceptual roots.

Undoubtedly, Gabriela A. Martinez cultivates pieces that manage to transcend in her universal dimension and philosophies the limits of the context, even though she recognizes herself as debtor of the artistic national praxis, referring to Fidelio Ponce, Los Once, Antonia Eiriz, or more specifically to Rigoberto Mena.

Consequently, her exhibitions between Cuba and United States have been well received, likewise in other countries such as Germany, England, Brazil, Argentina, Panama, Colombia, Spain, France, Puerto Rico, Portugal and Italy, where some of her outstanding art collections take place.