“Arterial: A Journey Through Urban and Natural Landscapes”

In ‘Arterial,’ I invite viewers to embark on a visual journey that traverses the dynamic landscapes of both the urban jungle and the serene tranquility of the upstate forests. Inspired by my personal experiences navigating the arteries of New York City and the winding roads leading to the nearby wilderness, each painting serves as a metaphorical exploration of connectivity, movement, and transformation.

As I traveled between the city’s bustling streets and the peaceful embrace of nature, I couldn’t help but draw parallels between the intricate networks of roads, bridges, and subway lines and the complicated systems of veins, arteries, and cells within the human body. As blood flows through our veins, energy pulses through the city’s infrastructure, creating a constant sense of motion and vitality. Through heavy texture, collage, and a vibrant color palette inspired by the urban landscape and the ever-changing hues of nature’s seasons, I aim to capture the essence of this duality. Each layer of paint represents a moment in time, a snapshot of the cyclical nature of life and death, growth, and decay.

From the stark beauty of winter’s icy grip to the vibrant burst of color that heralds the arrival of spring, ‘Arterial’ invites viewers to contemplate the interconnectedness of all things and to find beauty in the rhythm of life’s eternal dance. As you immerse yourself in each painting, let yourself be swept away by the ebb and flow of the city’s pulse and the timeless serenity of the natural world.

José Parlá creates paintings and multidisciplinary works based on his interest in hybrid forms of abstraction. He draws inspiration from various mediums including music, calligraphy, dance, and the decay of urban architecture and advertisements. His works poetically challenge ideas about language, politics, identity, and how we define places and spaces. Parlá’s relationship with mark-making is physical and textural, incorporating the body’s gestures into a painterly stream of consciousness composed of areas of addition, erasure, and layering that challenges the status quo of visual culture.

Biography

Parlá was born in 1973 to Cuban parents in Miami, Florida and lives and works out of Brooklyn, New York. He studied painting at Savannah College of Art & Design (SCAD) in Savannah, Georgia; the New World School of the Arts, Miami, Florida; and Miami Dade College, Miami, Florida. Solo exhibitions of Parlá’s work have been organized at institutions such as The Bronx Museum, New York (2022); Gana Art Center, Seoul (2022); Hong Kong Contemporary Art (HOCA) Foundation, Hong Kong (2019); Neuberger Museum of Art, New York (2018); SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah (2017); Goss-Michael Foundation, Dallas (2016); High Museum of Art, Atlanta (2015); amongst others. Public arts projects include permanent large scale commissions including Far Rockaway Writer’s Library, a collaboration between Snøhetta and Parlá, New York (2023); Amistad América, University of Texas, Austin (2018); One Union of the Senses, ONE World Trade Center, New York (2015); Nature of Language, in collaboration with Snøhetta, Hunt Library at North Carolina State University, Raleigh (2013); Diary of Brooklyn, Barclays Center, New York (2012). Parlá’s work is in several public collections including the Brooklyn Museum, New York; Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), Miami; The British Museum, London; Buffalo AKG Art Museum, New York; El Espacio, Miami; POLA Museum of Art, Japan; The Neuberger Museum of Art, New York; and The National Museum of Fine Arts, Havana.