Allusion (that comes from the Latin allusĭo) is a concept related to the verb to allude (to name, to indicate or to refer to a person, symbol or thing). An allusion means to talk about someone or something that is absent.

The L&B Gallery located in Barcelona (Álaba, 58) has the pleasure to present ALLUSIONS, the second exhibition of the Venezuelan artist Antonio Lazo.

“... In my work I allude to what the senses cannot catch, to not tangible things from reality: cultural identity, time, faith... This necessity emerges from a personal reaction caused by the image invasion, something that impedes the access to not visual things...”

Antonio Lazo, 2018.

With Allusions, Antonio Lazo invites to the dialogue, an analogical exhibition that doesn’t look for the confrontation. For the artist, the human being has always been doomed to the intangible things: identity, borders, eternity, love...

After living among Paris and Caracas for 30 years, he presents for the first time a serie that alludes to the cultural identity. For this, he works concerning two symbols that represents Venezuela politically: the flag and the map. Thus, a process of denial and / or extraction, he reaffirms his existence:

“... Logically, these topics are provoked by the cruel political drama that today afflicts to my country. I do not approve what Venezuela is today, an oppressed nation by an undemocratic and totalitarian government... that is why I do the action of covering the “tricoloured white flags”. Covering these symbols I reaffirm its existence. Covering the flag I reaffirm its cultural identity. To cover implies denying what Venezuela is today and I do it with white painting, which obviously alludes to peace ...”

Antonio Lazo, 2018.

In relation to the maps serie “Sensitivity test”, Lazo creates an extraction work eliminating the border lines of the country and the names of the capitals of the States, so as that the borders disappear making a point set alone at sight. This artwork alludes to the migrations that Venezuela is suffering.

“… Eliminating the borders of the map I allude to its intangibility, to the fact that they are an agreed by consensus convention. The Venezuelans leave the country, but the cultural identity out of these lines is just reaffirmed. Any Venezuelan who sees this point set in a plane will create a connection with the cultural identity of the country.”

Antonio Lazo, 2016

The tour of the exhibition is divided in three areas: starts with the allusion to the cultural identity (Venezuela) with the series (Tricoloured white flags) and the non-borders maps “Sensitivity test”; it continues with the artworks related to the time (across his superposed records of Paris’s skies) and to the eternity with clocks that don’t mark the time; finally, the exhibition finishes with the series of crosses alluding to the existential question concerning the continuity of life after death.

ANTONIO LAZO (Caracas, 1943)

Venezuelan artist that lives in Paris. From the middle of the eighties, he has presented various individual exhibitions among which it stands out: ‘Time’ L&B Gallery, (Barcelona, 2016); Real Time, The Box – Contemporary Art Gallery of Chacao Cultural Center (Venezuela, 2011) or the ones in Casa de América in Madrid, Sofía Imber Contemporary Art Museum, Caracas National Art Gallery, etcetera. He has taken part in several collective exhibitions in country such as Argentina, Spain, France, Mexico, Cuba and Venezuela.

His artworks are in collections such as (selection): Banco Mercantil, Caracas / Cisneros Colection, Caracas / Polar Foundation, Caracas / GAN / MACCSI Sofía Imber Contemporary Art Museum in Caracas / MAO / MBA Museum of Fine Arts in Caracas / Contemporary Art Museum in Monterrey, Mexico…