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By Perry Gil S. Mallari, Reporter
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Code Green |
ARTISTS have the ability to capture in visual
form the darkest recesses of the human psyche. This is evident in
the works of 28-year-old artist Tatong Recheta Torres. Torres’
works are arresting not only due to their superb draftsmanship but
also mainly because of their surreal character. One element is
ubiquitous in Torres’ most recent body of works—the “fat
man.” The imagery, Torres discloses, was inspired by his ordeal
being ridiculed as a fat kid.
The “fat man” played the central figure of a
tyrant in Torres’ first exhibit at the Hiraya Gallery in 2006
entitled “Dominion.” Perhaps a form of catharsis of a long
buried anguish, he portrayed in watercolor and charcoal the hulking,
bulging creature as an avenger slaying slender figures that most
probably represent his tormentors long ago.
Torres has a new series of oil paintings
scheduled for exhibit at the Hiraya Gallery on April 24. The “fat
man” is still there though now playing a more subdued role
supporting a new central figure—a peculiar six-legged creature.
Torres’ new set of images though grotesquely portrayed (plump
figures covered with blobs of flesh), carries a bearing of regality.
In viewing the paintings, one will be drawn to creating stories
inside his head out of the bizarre vista on display. Hiraya Gallery
director, Didi Dee comments that there’s more beyond the eerie
surface of Torres’ works, “They are ripe with deeper
meanings,” she points out.
A sense of contradiction cannot be dispelled in
describing Torres’ latest body of works; they are in every sense
of the word “horrifying and beautiful.”
Hiraya Gallery is located at 530 U.N. Avenue,
Ermita Manila.
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