Samuel Salcedo
CV - Biography:
SAMUEL SALCEDO
(1975, Barcelona)
Studies of Fine Arts at the University of Barcelona and at Manchester Metropolitan University, Department of Fine Arts.
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2016
“Bewilderment”, 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
“Photocall” Galerie Robert Drees. Hannover, Germany.
Anaid Gallery. Berlín, Germany.
2015
“DUST”. 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
Can Sisteré, Centre d’Art Contemporani. Santa Coloma, Barcelona, Spain.
"NIT". Llotja del tint. Banyoles, Girona, Spain.
2014
Galerie 100 Kubik. Cologne, Germany.
“Books”. Galeria Pilar Riberaygua. Andorra.
“Easy Like a Sunday Morning”, Osnova Gallery, Moscow, Russia
2013
“House of Mirrors”. 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
2012
“Gemeine Spezies”. 3 Punts Galerie. Berlin, Germany.
“Listen”. Galerie Robert Drees. Hannover, Germany.
2011
“Common Species”. 3 Punts Galeria, Barcelona, Spain.
“Traum”. Galerie 100 Kubik. Cologne, Germany.
2010
“Harvest”. Galería Fernando Latorre. Madrid, Spain.
“Wet Paint”. Galería Ferran Cano. Palma de Mallorca, Spain.
“Icons”. Galeria Pilar Riberaygua. Andorra.
2009
“Objects in a mirror are closer than they appear”. Luroa Galería de Arte. Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain.
“Real People”. 3 Punts Galeria, Barcelona, Spain.
2008
Galería Carmen del Campo. Córdoba, Spain.
Galerie Frédéric Got Fine Art. Paris, France.
2007
3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
2006
Galería José Lorenzo. Santiago de Compostela, Spain.
2005
Galeria Art72. Lleida, Spain.
3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
2003
3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
2002
Galería Clave. Murcia, Spain.
2000
Can Marc. Girona, Spain.
1998
Galeria Rose Selavy. Barcelona, Spain.
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2017
"International Airport". 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
“Context NY” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. New York, USA.
Salsali Private Museum, Dubai
"Art Madrid" Art Fair, with 3 Punts Galeria, Madrid, Spain
“Hardware”. 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain
2016
“Context Miami” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Miami, USA.
“Art Madrid” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Madrid, Spain.
“Swab” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
2015
“Frankfurt Art FAir”. 3 Punts Galeria. Frankfurt, Germany
"Art Madrid" Art Fair, with 3 Punts Galeria, Madrid, Spain
“Art.Fair” Contemporary Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Cologne, Germany.
“Swab” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
"Art15 London" Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. London, UK.
"Art Bodensee" Art Fair. Galerie Robert Drees. Bodensee, Austria.
"Vienna Art Fair". Galerie Robert Drees. Vienna, Austria.
2014
"Art Karlsruhe" Art Fair, 3 Punts Galeria, Karlsruhe, Germany
"Art Madrid" Art Fair, 3 Punts Galeria, Madrid, Spain
“Art.Fair” Contemporary Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Cologne, Germany.
“Swab” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.N
2013
“Art Madrid” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Madrid, Spain.
“Art Karlsruhe” art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Karlsruhe, Germany.
“Ready to Jump”. 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain
“Preview Berlin” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Berlín, Germany.
“Swab” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
“Art.Fair” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Cologne, Germany.
2012
“Just Mad” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Madrid, Spain.
“Art Madrid” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Madrid, Spain.
“Arte Fiera. Art First”. Bologne, Italy.
“Una inclinación Natural”, 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
“Swab” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
“Berliner Liste” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Berlin, Germany.
“Preview Berlin” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Berlin, Germany.
“Art.Fair” Contemporary Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Cologne, Germany.
Collective exhibition “Un raro visitante”. Twin Gallery. Madrid, Spain
“Künst Zürich” Art Fair. Galerie Robert Drees. Zürich, Switzerland.
“Arte Fiera”. Galerie Robert Drees . Bologne, Italy.
2011
“Art Madrid” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Madrid, Spain.
“Scope Art Show New York”. New York, USA.
“Arte Fiera. Art First”. Bologne, Italy.
“Art Karlsruhe. Karlsruhe, Germany.
“Art Chicago”. Chicago, USA.
“Espacio Atlántico” Contemporary Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Vigo, Spain.
“Swab” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
“Un sur trois”. La Cave. Geneva, Switzerland.
“Berliner Liste” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Berlin, Germany.
“Preview Berlin” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Berlin, Germany.
“Art.Fair” Contemporary Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Cologne, Germany.
2010
“Espacio Atlántico” Contemporary Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Vigo, Spain.
“Art Madrid” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Madrid, Spain.
“Polimorfos Perversos” Galería Fernando Pradilla. Madrid, Spain.
“Swab 2010” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
“Hot Fair”, Contemporary Art Fair. Basel, Switzerland.
Galerie Marc de Coene. Erolzheim, Germany.
“Berliner Liste” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Berlin, Germany.
“Art Fair 21”. 3 Punts Galeria. Cologne, Germany.
“Art Miami” Art Fair. Miami, USA.
“Seamos realistas. Nueva figuración contemporánea”. MUA (Museo Universitario de Alicante). Alicante, Spain.
“St-Art” Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Strasbourg, France.
2009
"ArtMadrid" Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Madrid.
Lille Art Fair 2009. Lille, France.
“Sky's the limit” (LaBonita) “Can Sisteré”. Santa Coloma de Gramanet, Spain.
“B.Giner, S. Salcedo, Cherif et Geza”. Couvent des Minimes. Galerie Roger Castang.Perpignan, France.
"Rund um die Figuration". Galerie 100 Kubik. Cologne, Germany.
"Berliner Liste" Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Berlin, Germany.
"Estampa" Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Madrid, Spain.
"Por si las moscas". Galería Fernando Latorre. Madrid, Spain.
"A l'entorn d'una realitat". Benito Artis. Manlleu, Barcelona, Spain.
2008
"ArtMadrid" Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Madrid.
"Berliner Liste" Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Berlin.
"La Realitat Alterada". 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
2007
"Art Madrid" Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Madrid, Spain.
"¿Realidad o ficción?". Galeria 9MA. Barcelona, Spain.
"Catalunya Look". Art-Center Berlin Friedrichstrasse. Berlin, Germany.
"Arte Lisboa". Lisboa, Portugal.
"St-Art" Art Fair. 3 Punts Galeria. Strasbourg, France.
"Miguel Ángel Iglesias, Efraïm Rodríguez, Samuel Salcedo". Galeria d’Art Pilar Riberaygua. Andorra.
2006
"Art Madrid" Art Fair. Madrid, Spain.
"Flesh". Galería Clave. Murcia, Spain.
"Llegadas y Salidas". 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
"Puro Arte". Vigo, Spain.
2005
"On és en Léger?". 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
"Propuestas para una colección". Galería Clave. Murcia, Spain.
"Munt de terra". Galeria Cort. Banyoles, Spain
2004
"Un altre món". 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
"Alegría". Galeria Kalós. Barcelona, Spain.
"Femenino Plural". Galería Gema Lazcano. Madrid, Spain.
"La quinta dimensión". Galería Clave. Murcia, Spain.
"Testimoni. Fundació La Caixa". Palacio del Almudí. Murcia, Spain.
2003
"Extraños niños". 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
"Tondos". Galería Gema Lazcano. Madrid, Spain.
2002
“30x30". Laberinto Galería de Arte. Granada, Spain.
"On tens el cap?". 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
"Tondos". Galería Clave. Murcia, Spain.
Séptimo Aniversario. 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
II Biennial of Contemporary Realism and Figuration. Galería Clave. Murcia, Spain.
2001
“New Art'01". 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
"Art Emergent". Artexpo'01. Barcelona, Spain.
"7 anys". 3 Punts Galeria. Barcelona, Spain.
2000
Galeria Ferran Cano. Barcelona, Spain.
1998
"Qui va matar Pinotxo?". Galeria Rose Selavy. Barcelona, Spain
COLLECTIONS
Blumenfeld Collection. New York, USA.
Salsali Private Museum, Dubai
Testimoni La Caixa Foundation, Spain.
Fran Daurel Foundation, Spain.
Vila-Casas Foundation, Spain.
Ayuntamiento de Ceutí, Murcia Collection. Spain.
Bassat Collection, Spain.
DKV Foundation, Spain.
Lluís Coromina Foundation, Spain
Bank M2M Europe AS, Riga, Latvia.
Jardins d'Etrétat, Normandy, France.
SOLO Collection, Madrid, Spain.
Information
NORMAL
That’s Why I’m Easy, Easy like a Sunday Morning
Easy, by Lionel Richie
Apparently when Superman, after saving the residents of Manhattan from the umpteenth attack by Lex Luthor, comes home and takes of his tunic, he likes to wander around in his underwear looking at repeats of Stories from the Crypt on television. He often nods off with beer in hand and wakes up in the middle of the night to drag himself off to bed grudgingly. The next day, he shaves, puts hair cream on and returns to his task since he has an image to maintain. The woman who sells me my bread every day likes being spat into her face when she makes love. I have a friend who loves heavy-metal who loves the films of Jennifer Aniston, and I think he sometimes puts on make-up like her. I follow a person on Twitter who likes informing the entire world whenever he is in an airport or railway station. The other day I met him in the supermarket, having just tweeted that he was taking a flight to Berlin. I have some neighbours, a gay couple who have just retired, who I sometimes see chasing each other around the garden dressed up as bunnies. We are living in a time in which it is difficult to define what intimacy means. Until now it was a redoubt in which everything that we did not want others to know about us could occur; a safe place in which everything could happen far from the severe gaze of the other. With the heyday of the social networks and the arrival of the web 2.0 we have been irremediably hurled into the public view. Thus we spend increasingly more time creating our personal brands with which we aim to seduce and convince others how interesting our lives are. We place increasingly more emphasis on constructing characters with which to attract the attention of others. The time we dedicate to producing this public image of ourselves, in tagging ourselves in photos, in telling everyone what film we liked or what concert we are going to, gradually creates a kind of projection of our ideal external life, a public intimacy that coexists alongside all those things that we are unable to tell, this B reality, which on few occasions we allow to blossom. When it happens, when the photos of the famous going to the nursery school without make-up are filtered in the press, when our mother enters the room right in the middle of a full masturbatory session, when finally we manage to get the clothes off our partner for the first time or when we come across a famous actor in the early hours drunk in a bar, we realise that reality is rather coarse. Boring on most occasions, a little sordid with luck, irrelevant most times. Here is where the deception begins. The private video of Paris Hilton with Rick Solomon is so insipid, so normal, that it soon loses all interest. The day-to-day of our desires, of our perversions, of our B-side, is so prosaic that it will never pass our personal censure. Not for being dark, but for being insubstantial. Samuel Salcedo has become a specialist in observing through those peepholes through which nobody else wants to look. In opening windows into rooms to which nobody had thought of visiting. In this way Salcedo dominates normality. With his sculptures he takes away the drama of loneliness, removes the moral judgement from the subjects, turns his working material into the most intimate form, and highlights the coarseness of what reality is. He always catches his characters off-balance, in their worst moment, at that moment that they could never broadcast or communicate. Without show, he reveals that we are always somewhat alone. In this way he discovers that naked our neighbour is not such a special person. Intimacy is much more banal than we would like to imagine. Stripped of our brands and our social identity, we are slightly pathetic, however much we would like to camouflage it. Salcedo has the patience and the virtue to portray everything that others would never think about showing. Of seeing the absurd moment before the fall. Of continuing to watch the clown after the curtain has dropped. Of holding the gaze long after the joke has ended. Of stripping people of arrogance and vanity. Of catching us when we have already dropped our guard, when the personal brands are no longer of any use. In Salcedo’s world the human is very close to the animal from which he so much wants to escape. Moreover, by metonymy towards the objects that populate his universe they remain trapped in this ambiguous space. Life in a pure state, this naked life, leaves few turns where one can hide. Only a mask, to placate the toughness of the situation from which one cannot hide behind, this postmodern invention that is identity. The personal brand disappears. Samuel Salcedo’s characters can no longer trick us. His works confront us with the discrete brutality of what is normal. They are mirrors of the moments in life that we have never had a special interest in seeing. He pokes us with bits of reality. The darkest desires, the most bizarre situations, in Salcedo’s work the most supreme ridicule acquires a shade of the everyday. The darkest perversion, free of moral judgement, becomes at the most, an absurd gesture. Intimacy, stripped of all fiction, stops sparkling. In this way we learn an important lesson: the king has always been in the altogether. The down side is that Salcedo reminds us that at the end of the day, we are too. Thus these sculptures move us and hurt us. They get a smile out of us that we would like to conceal. They take us to places that we try to avoid. And thus, Superman will arrive home another night and strip off in front of the television. The baker will get more and more excited the closer she reaches home, fantasising about the evening’s entertainment she is going to enjoy. The heavy-metal fan will boast to his friends that he doesn’t believe in love. The twitter will imagine he is boarding a plane when he sees the underground train arrive and my neighbours, the gay couple, will have supper with their respective families tonight and tell them their love life is going well. That’s all there is, at the end of the day, life is quite normal.
Jaron Rowan
Cultural Researcher