Mirroring Nature (2007-2010)

"The emblem of the automobile as an embodiment of the promise of America as an icon of Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness would permeate the entire culture, Catholic and Protestant alike, and this metaphor of corporeal intelligence would be reinforced throughout the nineteen fifties and sixties."

Dave Hickey, Air Guitar

​

In a city designed to be driven, not walked, "your car is like your shoes", as the local mantra asserts, and the landscape is fashioned from crowded highways and streets coexisting with manicured public gardens mostly comprised of non-native invasive plants, which themselves are elegantly reflected in the glistening bumpers of 4-wheel-drive trucks and SUVs.

My paintings reflect fragments of this mixed landscape where conflicting elements dialogue with each other. The buildings glass facades reflect the pack of cars whose windshields and bumpers in turn reflect the Washington and Cardboard Palms, the Surinam Cherries, and the red Ixora flowers planted throughout the city. These deceptively beautiful paintings on canvas, carry an embedded warning about where this nonsensical superhighway may be taking us.

​

Rafael López-Ramos

​