CHEMA MADOZ's Poetica

Exhibition period: 2009.1.11-2009.2.28

Venue: Spanish Consulate General in Shanghai

In the sping festival last month, i came back my home town Shanghai and visited several exhibitions there. Here is one of those.

The exhibition is named POETICA, a spanish word meaning poetic. It is a photography show operated by the Spanish photographer Chema Madoz. His works focus on the subtle things in the dairy life that people used to ignore. He uses some trick ways to fool the spectators' eyes in order to establish a model that makes viewers think deeply.

Like this photo, the auther hides a crutch in it pretending to be a banister. In the first sight of this, you could not ingnore of this subtle difference. But when you approach the photo, you could find the trick.

In the auther's words, he wants to express the existence of truth in front of the people. In some ways, it looks like the art works of post-modernity which aims to overthrow the traditional social ideology.

And in this photo, it describe a metal spoon in a glass and coming down like a soft sponge. That is impossible! How could be a metal spoon soft like this! You will be amazing when you see this photo. But that is the point what auther like to tell.

Thinking if the photo transfers the truth or not. We use to think that photography is a kind of tools recording the things really happen, but in another view, it could be not. The more you trust the photos, the more you will be cheated. That is the paradox of photography especially in the recent world.

It is the superrealism style that looks like Man Ray's works. Chema Madoz wants to post a new kind of view to explore the details in the daily life. Maybe it is not so innovative in the contemporary art, but the exhibiton hold in Shanghai is good for people to be learned of much more about art.