Edgardo Jorge Lugo
ARTIST'S STATEMENT
The earliest influences on my art
were my family, my community, the industrial city of Hartford, Connecticut,
and the natural wonders of Puerto Rico. As a boy, my father taught me to make
kites, vejigante masks, mix paint, and encouraged my natural ability to draw.
The Santos, totems, dolls, and masks on my mother's , aunt's, and grandmother's
altars were powerful , magical, spirit images to my child's eyes, as were the
organic sea forms that crept up on the shores of the La Playa. These images
have always found their way to my canvas, whether as realistic aspects, parts
of surreal picture stories, or abstractions.
Growing up in Hartford, Connecticut,
has exposed me not only to its rich history, but also to the many different
cultures found within the cities limits. I was noticed for my talents and chosen
to attend a program for gifted children after school. I was able to share my
ideas with other kids, from other communities, and backgrounds. In the end,
I found that the more I shared, the more I learned not only of different cultures,
but of myself as well.
The legacy of my ancestry inclines
me toward a method of blending images and ideas with spiritual and emotional
expressions. I believe it is the lyrical beauty from such syncretic power that
gives profound meaning to the notion of harmony. The flow of images and their
sensibility connect. This compels me to discover the totality in the painting,
to use the chromatic quality and the textural surface, to blend ideas and images
into a diverse although unified whole, to capture the flowing and the ethereal
quality of spiritual energy. I synthesize in my paintings various strands of
my particular cultural legacy and also unite them into my worldview, and project
them into my paintings. The narrative abstractions of figures, symbols, and
forms which manifests themselves on the canvases upon which I work tell of the
Puerto Rican integration of the Afro-Caribbean spiritual knowing that has sustained
and nourished my people. This knowing is my source of inspiration, language,
and power.
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MEDIA & COMPANY
All copyrights reserved, Edgardo
Lugo, Media & Company, 2000.