User:Mcgrait 26

Patrick McGrath Muñiz (McGrait)

“Everything is presence; all the centuries are the present one”

                                                                                                             -Octavio Paz

McGrath Muñiz work is a response to the apparent anachronisms of growing up in Puerto Rico, the oldest colony in the world and the country with most cars per square mile. A Roman Catholic background has played a crucial part in informing his work. His paintings explore the relationship between traditional Christian icons and our modern day consumerist society. They present a world where spirituality is consumed by triviality as religious symbols lose much of their original meaning and are displaced by disposable merchandise from the media culture. As the painter says: "By using the “retablo” I am able to emulate previous indoctrination strategies and to implement them as purveyors of capitalist propaganda. My recontextualization of the “retablo” altarpiece painting, imported to the New World in colonial times, questions today’s assumptions about the demise of colonialism". His work also questions the set of values imported from a corporate global economy. These “retablos” react to belief systems intrinsic to modern capitalist society, religion and culture. Muñiz explains his work: "I see them as history books meant to be read carefully ‘between the lines’. The lines in this case are the constant commercial interruptions implicit in the message". His latest body of work comments on socio-political issues that have shaped Latin American history. In re-defining personal identity and establishing a connection with history and culture, the artist aims to extinguish the intolerable historic amnesia that affects us all.

<--Mcgrait 26 09:07, 18 November 2006 (UTC)