Interview with Josefina Ayllón | Rise Art

“I have normally painted with my fingers, kind of like sculpturing the paint … I guess I will need that type of call with my perform: I have to have to experience the supplies.”

By Tatty Martin | 01 Jun 2022

Josefina Ayllón is a self-taught artist centered in Rome. Doing the job in an expressive impasto style, Josefina results in portraits of both recognisable and unrecognisable sitters. Many of her subjects are fictional figures, and with a significant software of paint and a bold strategy to brushwork, Josefina explores the pressure between physicality and the makebelieve. 

Josefina sees colour, texture and the marriage among the two, as a signifies of building depth. Oils allow for Josefina to construct up texture and type a painting surface that appears tangible, or as she phone calls it, “a bi-dimensional object”. Josefina is new to Rise Art, and to welcome her to the system, we not too long ago caught up with her and learnt more about her observe and journey as an artist. 

 

Untitled (JA0616), 2020 by Josefina Ayllón

How would you explain your type and the do the job you make?

I paint expressionist portraits. My major aim is the colour and the material. I guess that when searching at my get the job done one particular would say that the issue make a difference is the portrait, when in truth I think about the paint alone to be the most important character.

I feel all paintings to be abstract, it is one’s work to make a decision regardless of whether to target on the perform as a thing figurative or not. I have normally painted with my fingers, form of like sculpturing the paint, which is odd simply because I normally take pleasure in observing the brushstrokes of quite a few painters. But I guess I require that type of contact with my get the job done: I require to experience the elements. I nonetheless paint the backgrounds with a brush, but for the figures, I require to break the intermediation of the brush between my hand and the canvas. Also, the texture this way of portray generates has a unique impact underneath the lights, there is a significantly larger contrast among the figure and the floor. The character will become even additional in solitude in just the composition.

 

Tell us a little bit about the inspiration behind your observe.

The inspiration will come mostly from my inside of. It really is an unconscious somewhat than a mindful system. I believe that that the perform I develop echoes the activities I have lived and the cultural stimuli that surround me.

 

Untitled (JA0621) by Josefina Ayllón

How do you go about selecting the topics for your paintings?

I often paint imaginary people, specifically in modest paintings. Normally, I use photographs that I stumble upon from unique resources as a beginning stage. Even so, I are inclined to forget about them the moment I am painting.

I feel that is why my paintings do not have a title. Even if I use a individual in concrete as a source of inspiration, at the time I begin to paint, this will convert into a entirely distinct portrait. In reality, if the particular person and the portrait glimpse alike, I come to feel that in a way I have failed.

 

How has your exercise evolved in new decades?

A handful of years in the past, the portraits that I painted ended up only about making imaginary topics and my way of functioning was variety of intuitive. But with time my focus shifted to a little something less summary. Even although I keep on to do the job in that way, I now use a additional figurative strategy in some of my paintings.

Regarding the medium, throughout my initially methods I painted with oils, but quickly I experienced to change to acrylic paint thanks to simple motives. On the other hand, when using acrylics, it grew to become pretty evident to me that oil paint is considerably a lot more alive. It is an organic and natural material, coming from nature, that elders with time. Thus a couple many years ago I went back to painting with oils. Lately, I have been experimenting with oil sticks on paper, which allows me to deepen substantially a lot more on the gestures of my portraits.

 

Untitled (JA0527) by Josefina Ayllón

What is an ordinary day like in your studio?

My studio is positioned in the suburbs of Rome, so I consider the educate every morning to get there. I am not tightened to a unique plan, but I are likely to operate until 4 or 5 p.m. As my workspace is situated outside the house of the town, I definitely recognize the silence and the privateness that I have when painting.

 

Who are your crucial influences?

There are several artists that I dearly admire, however, I in no way viewed as them as possessing a direct influence on my get the job done. To title a number of: Baselitz, de Kooning, Guston, Auerbach, Alice Neel.

 

Untitled (JA0555) by Josefina Ayllón

Who are some Increase Artwork artists with do the job you are making the most of at the second?

Clare Thatcher, Karoline Kroiss, Barbara Howey

 

Are you doing work on any interesting new projects?

I am presently working on a sequence in which I am portray a lot of topics, each and every one particular in two different variations. Then I will get two diverse final results for each portrait.