Description
I painted “Protesta” inspired by a cover photo of an American magazine reportage (“The truth”) and many pictures of demonstrations in Caracas. I wanted to shape the energy and the desire for change of our young people, the anguish and suffering of my people, a rich people impoverished by bad administrations. Politicians do not demonstrate. They don’t expose themselves. Young people take risks. After twenty years of the so-called “Chavista Revolution”, which marked an economic and moral involution, we really want to evolve. The setting of the painting is Caracas, surrounded by mountains, “L’Avila”, the lung of the capital city, disfigured by illegal constructions and by poverty, but always a source of greenery, of air, silent witness of this struggle. For the buildings I made a collage using Venezuelan paper money “The Bolivar”, which from being one of the most valuable currency of the subcontinent has become waste paper. I tried to recycle it in some way. I also used paper clippings that recall the articles of the “Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic”, about autonomy and management of the national natural resources, such as oil, which I also represented through the extraction equipment. The autonomy was trampled on by foreign concessions and the inconsiderate sale of this and many other resources, exploited by governments to perpetuate themselves. On the drills I glued an image of our liberator Simòn Bolivar, upside down as his thoughts were turned upside down by greed and rampant corruption. On the ground the busts of heroes, whose legacy has been forgotten and offended. The tricolour flag, used as a dress, a headgear, with the stars that fell down and got lost… A pregnant woman weeps desperately, but from her womb a light can be glimpsed. Maybe the hope that you can change, evolve, start again. Destroy to rebuild. The remaining young people are risking their lives since they believe in freedom, freedom to express themselves, to remain in their own land and to manage their own resources, before they are completely consumed.
