" Enigmatic Figures " at ArtSpace/Virginia Miller Galleries

Tuesday, 30 May 2006 11:16

Coral Gables ( Miami ) - Two Argentine artists, Mateo Argüello Pitts and José Benito, dominate the exhibition “Enigmatic Figures” at ArtSpace/Virginia Miller Galleries in Coral Gables.

Pitts, who often uses a male boxer as a metaphor for everyone’s daily struggles, is represented by 13 paintings.  A typical work shows the boxer on his hands and knees, mouth open in a possible scream of anguish or triumph, carrying the burden of a tree symbolizing his family and heritage.  Other paintings show an eccentric androgynous figure wearing a skirt and mis-matched hose, possibly representing artists as iconoclasts.

Three sculptures and two paintings by Benito feature his typical themes of children clasping something precious and male-female relationships.  The children and their undefined treasures may be the artist’s comments on everyone’s cherished memories or possessions.  A third work shows a male head emerging from beneath the skirt of a headless female figure.

Although both Pitts and Benito have exhibited widely in Argentina, this show marks their first major exhibition in a Florida gallery.  Also in the exhibition are sculptures by Aurora Cañero of Spain and Maria Gamundi of Venezuela.

Cañero’s five-foot bronze-and-stainless steel work shows a figure surrounded by spheres, suggesting that each of us has our own place in the universe.  Cañero is a well-established international sculptor whose works frequently are exhibited in leading international art fairs.

Gamundi, whose tabletop classical female nudes are familiar to gallery regulars, is exhibiting a nearly life-sized bronze of a reclining nude female, her languid form resting on a bronze cube.  A 12-inch tabletop bronze shows a female nude in a compressed yoga position.