AUGUST VILELLA
Intuitive Surrealism
August Vilella is an artist from Barcelona based in Tokyo. His artworks have been exhibited around the world in cities such as Los Angeles, Hong Kong, Paris, Shanghai, Dubai, Tokyo, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Taipei, Oxford, Shenzhen, San Francisco, Rotterdam... etc. In 2016 he was the winner for The Best Artist at the Tokyo International Art Fair and in 2017 winner for the Best Innovative Art at The Global Art Awards of Dubai (UAE). In 2018 he won the "International Artist Grand Prize" of Taipei and the "Chairman´s Award" in the Art Revolution Taipei where his work has been chosen as the best among 4,546 candidates. Furthermore, prestigious magazines such as "The Global Times","Vice", "Hi-Fructose" and "Beautiful Bizarre" have reported about his impressive development as a master of his genre.
He creates oil paintings by means of a surreal-intuitive method. Thanks to this process, he tries to give shape to his subconscious mind without using any previous sketches or ideas. The result of this practice evokes a dreamlike aura and a magical, metaphoric, and even philosophical language, which invites the observing visitor to reflect. All this iconography is represented with a very refined technic. His style can remind us of old masters because he works with very small brushes, puts many slim layers of oil paint and varnish and plays with the lights and shadows. In consequence, we can see in Vilella´s artworks a very curious contrast between a very technical and elaborated style, and a creative process that turns out to be completely intuitively improvised and unintentional... like a Jazz painting. Like the own August Vilella is used to say: "-I don't choose my characters... in some way they choose me. And when we remove the will of the artist regarding his creation, each painting becomes a work of art of the world and for the world; a piece of art in which all people can find themselves reflected, and above all, a work of art with a life of its own that wants to be seen, to awaken and to be felt."
All this turns each of the paintings of August Vilella into an Odyssey, which moves down into the depths of the vast subjective ocean, whose outcome is always unknown, different and unexpected...