Rafael Trelles


Rafael Trelles is a postmodern artist from Puerto Rico.

Rundown

After receiving a bachelor's degree in Art from the University of Puerto Rico, Trelles enrolled as a graduate student at the University of Mexico in Mexico City, where he eventually earned a doctorate. In 1985 he moved to the Canary Islands in Spain to develop the key work that would envision the art making process of his later works in regards to alchemy, mysticism, magic and suspicion. Though he never quite understood the true value of Dada against the sound factories of the industrial revolution, Trelles over-seeded the figurative aspect of Surrealism in resemblance to printmaking by Dutch Painters during the Baroque Age to clear cut some of the tensions behind Pop Art and New Realism in regards to 1963's Soirée. His small connotations to the world of ghost hinduism and buddhist antiGothics is highly denoted throughout much of his paintings with dust etching nograffiti and squashed expressionism. Some of his later works resemble the antithesis to David Carson's Fotografiks, paintings with a graphic attitude, and Takashi Murakami's public New York City exhibitions from.

Figurations on Plastic

Figurations on Plastic is an exhibition by two artists in the field of post-modern surrealist figuration, Rafael Trelles in conjunction with María Antonieta Ordóñez. According to Manuel Alvarez Lezama, Trelles and Ordóñez have accepted the challenge to turn the human figure into poetry by using plastic as their support to let us see ourselves on plastic, an everyday reality for millions in this technology-oriented society of ours.

Urban art

In Concrete (Urban Graphic) – Documentary (2004)

Using a pressurized water hose and plastic stencils as medium for experimental graphic art, Trelles engraves elaborate designs of dirt and grime on walls, sidewalks and lamp-posts which resembles the Moorish heritage of Andalusian tiles as a world symbol of soul.

On Concrete (Urban Graphic in Buenos Aires) – Documentary (2007)

En Concreto is an artistic project of urban interventions developed by Rafael Trelles since the summer of 2004 on the walls, side walks and utility poles of several cities including the island of Vieques. It's an experimental graphic work originally designed for placing in abandoned sectors of worldwide cities. Proyecto 'ace traces and documents the development of this landmark public exhibition in the city of Buenos Aires into film.

Life and education

Rafael Trelles was born on April 27, 1957 in Santurce, Puerto Rico. He began studying painting at the age of eleven, under the guidance of Spanish painter Julio Yort. In 1980, Trelles obtained a Magna Cum Laude bachelor's degree in Art at the University of Puerto Rico. In 1983, he traveled to Mexico where he pursued graduate studies at the Universidad Autónoma de México. Today he lives and work in Puerto Rico.

Individual exhibitions

He has been awarded with the first prize for best exhibition in contemporary media from the Puerto Rico Art Critics Association; the “Emeritus Award” for the excellence of his artistic career from the National Endowment of Puerto Rico, as well as the Art Medal from the Puerto Rican Association of Artists with UNESCO.