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Early talent, Anthony Hernandez recalls with lightness and serenity the years spent in Havana during the far from easy regime of Fidel Castro: where, since the age of 6 he was drawing on the ground, when with a “scooter”, as he calls it, made of some wooden planks and two wheels recovered somewhere, he wandered between the Malecón and Havana Vieja. Going for a walk with his mother for museums, churches and palaces, contemplating the sinuous lines in the works of Amelia Peláez, the vivifying force in the art of René Portocarrero or the abstract art of Mario Carreño. Images, color and art that have remained within him as an intense expression of his history that is the history of Cuban art, more than ever appreciated, as demonstrated by the various exhibitions during the Miami Art Week. Until the age of 12, Anthony lived with his family who, rebellious against the Castro system, was put in prison forcing him to live with his uncle and later with his grandmother who had previously moved to the United States, to Chicago. Since then Antony’s steps have been great: he built his own family, he moved to Florida convinced that everything is in some way connected:“Our actions and our intentions, whether good or bad, create a chain reaction. Each work or piece in any medium I use will carry that message of connection. I always emphasize that art and life go hand in hand; it is about decisions not conditions.”
Entering his studio, it’s like entering a studio of what you see on the glossy pages of the best furniture magazines, it’s an experience by the WOW factor: rich in vintage Cuban and American objects, curious antiquities, a gigantic mural, made by him, covering the entire wall, canvases everywhere and beyond that, like a good Cuban, shiny vintage cars like models, of which he says he is passionate. “I have not used them for months: I just need to turn them on, feel that the engine is working and that’s okay, I do not have time to take it for a walk now, I have to paint. I paint at any moment, I sleep very little “.
I was able to attend the pop-up show of his latest collection of the series Masterpieces Series, curated by Lola International Agent, his agent, in the Paradise Plaza of the Design District, and the fact that he decided to write about him says a lot. Lola, Parisian by birth and American by adoption with a portfolio of 25 artists, specializes in Pop Art and Street Art, has been working with Anthony for over three years and is very satisfied with the results: “Anthony’s art is a fresh and innovative art that sells very well “.
The art of Anthony Hernandez is undoubtedly of great impact, it is for the size and the particularity of his works, that with the exception of the series Pins on Boards, entirely made with drawing pins, mainly uses oil or acrylic on canvas, with the disruptive use of colors, applied in various ways, from the long brushstroke to the dripped effect.
The Colors series is an example: themes and different subjects, from the recurrent artists contemplated by Anthony in other series, to singers, nudes of women, children, up to representing the only parts of the body, feet, hands and ears, all soaked in color that fades to demarcate the clear contours of the subjects.
Addicted, on the other hand, is a provocative and liberating series with a strong and clear message: color yourself, do yourself with art. Art through color is able to fill the gap of our lives. In this series the art and the artistic subject are immortalized in the act of dependence through the canonical gestures habitually used by those who do drugs: sniffing, getting in the mood, getting entangled. The object, however, which sniffs, injects itself and ingests in this case color, in all its forms: liquid, powdered, compressed, godet. Color and art are means that can change life.
Also in the Black and White series the subject of the works is very different, consisting of both portraits and bodies with a remarkable anatomical structure. The meaning of Black and White is actually wider than could be inferred. White presents itself as a dynamic element that accompanies the observer towards the intense black of the ink, that is towards the color that creates from the white canvas and which expresses the artist’s interior, then modulating itself in the infinite shades of gray, which originate traces and emotions, creating an indissoluble solidarity between the two colors black and white. With the exception of the work “YAM what YAM” and “Untitled” all the other works are united by the presence of leaves. Colored leaves that seem to caress the face and bodies of the subjects represented emphasizing on one hand the transience, on the other immortality: the ephemeral that materializes in an immortal gesture.
His latest series, the object of the pop-up exhibition in Paradise Plaza, is titled Masterpieces Series, and consists – for the moment – of 11 acrylic works on canvas with dimensions of 48 ” x 60 ” x 2.5 ” ( 120x 150x 6 cm) each dedicated to a great master: Picasso, Vincent Van Gogh, Salvador Dali, Frida Khalo, Jean Michael Basquiat, Keith Haring, Henri Matisse, Gustav Klimt, Georgia O’Keeffe, Jeff Koons and Fernando Botero. The series is characterized by the face and the ends played in shades of white, black and grayscale and the body of the artists in question covered by the flow of colors given by the representation of their own works, reproduced by Anthony in a temporal excursus that envelops the body entirely. In this way Anthony wants to create a sort of legacy, personal first but not only, with the artist who, according to his point of view and following analysis, study and personal research has left an indelible mark in the artistic culture of all time.
In addition to these well-known and legitimized subjects worldwide, Belin and Bikismo are in production: two great street artists, the first of Spanish origin, the second of Puerto Rican origin, who will meet together with the greatest street artists from all over the world to paint a building at Wynwood during Miami Art Week in a unveiled and unpublished location at the last minute. Anthony will also take part in the event. In addition to painting on canvas he paints murals. According to Anthony there is a thin line of demarcation between mural art and street art: the latter, born in New York slums with characters like Basquiat’s and Haring’s , used walls as disruptive and creative mediums to bring to light and challenge social issues , while the art of murals has a broader dialogue with the public. The works on the wall par excellence are unique pieces of large dimensions that burst like pictorial fireworks, capturing the spectator’s wide open eyes.
