Josep Uclés and Koak Prints Collection

12/23/2020-3/30/2021

This time, YiCOLLECTA has brought wonderful prints from two foreign artists. Both of them use lines to depict “human figures” that portray daily behaviors, providing however, different visual perceptions.

Spanish artist Joseph Uclés uses lines as the main subject, with the prints showcasing a dark and mysterious sense of ritualism in order to depict ironic elements. These symbols possess concrete human figures or objects that create a fantasy world full of surreal colors. The dark brushwork is deeply critical, and satirizes the fact that human beings may be monsters in human skin, living in the everyday world without us knowing it.

Joseph Uclés was born in 1952 in a town in Catalonia, Spain, and died in 2013. He was one of the representative artists of the European Neo-Sculpture School after the war. Joseph Uclés’s first exhibition was as the Badalona Museum, and his artistic career has flourished ever since. In 1978, he participated in the Senyi i Rauxa exhibition (featuring avant-garde Catalan art) at Pompidou Centre in Paris. He was later recognized and selected by Hans-Jürgen Müller (a major German gallery owner and writer) for his participation in the historic “Europa 79”, which at the time exhibited representative works of the 80’s avante-garde. His unique and critical style set him apart from the art market. Uclés’s collections are in the Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art (MACBA), Badalona Museum, Granollers Museum, and private collections around the world.

Like Matisse (master of Fauvism), who uses clean lines to depart from the classical and idealized portrayal of the female body, San Francisco based artist Koak who specializes in comic art, uses multiple materials to create works with precise and neat brushstrokes that depicts women honestly. The awkward physical state of the characters permeate in her creations, beautiful yet challenging. She believes that people shouldn’t exist in a single emotional state, as it’s rare in real life. She attempts to liberate the image of women within an art history world written by men, and encapsulate the universal narrative and embodiment of women. In the painting, the lines of the female body are curved and irregular, conveying the original sense of vulnerability, in order for her audience to think about the meaning of humanity.

Koak has always been fascinated by the weak or non-mainstream cultures as a reaction to social norms. She believes that comics are an art form that combines visual art and literature. Comics are also an act of telling stories through visual language. Comics and paintings have similar forms to painting and convey narratives by using static lines, shapes and colors. However, there is an interesting question when it comes to painting, which is how to screen out text and create language in space and static images.

Koak was born in San Francisco in 1981 and currently lives and works in San Francisco. She holds a master’s degree in comic art from the California College of the Arts. Her works have been exhibited in art galleries in London, Los Angeles, and San Francisco.

*Since the works are overseas, it will take 2-3 weeks for delivery, please be patient*
（Exhibition Ended）

Curator: YiCOLLECTA