Edgar Cano: South/Realism/X

edgar cano: south/realism/x

November 20, 2021 - January 8, 2022

Press Release

Ro2 Art is proud to present SOUTH/REALISM/X, the first U.S. solo exhibition of works by the renowned Mexican artist Edgar Cano. The show will run from November 20, 2021 through January 8, 2022. The exhibition will open with a reception at Ro2 Art the Cedars located at 1501 S Ervay St, Dallas, TX and will take place from 7-10 PM.

Mexican painter Edgar Cano uses of a blend of abstraction and realism to explore the boundaries of memory and heritage. Cano’s work is influenced by dance and theater from his time using drawing and lithography for set design. His compositions recall 19th century portrait painting, yet the realistically rendered figures become smeared, obscured behind pattern or hyper-pigmented veils. They hold hidden, playful symbols. Landscape and figuration become windows surrounded by high-chroma fields and rhythmic geometry.

artist statement

"Figurative Preciousness in the proceeding, not in essence; the body is the axis of my strokes, with its roots and fictions invented in its own drama. The events of ordinary life get expanded through the pigmented micro-mirror of the canvas; the painting, as a surface of reflection, reproduces the intersection of interpretation and personal experience, becomes the support for metaphors, unfinished speeches, and theoretical alloys that complement each other only by being in front of the observer. I use irony and the lack of sense of things to create a reflection that converges with the visual heritage of modern society."

about the artist

Edgar Cano (b. Mexico, 1977)

In more than fifteen years of art production, he has been distinguished and awarded in various national and international competitions, among these: Acquisition prize of the III Biennial of Visual Arts of Veracruz (2016) two-dimensional category, acquisition prize of the XVII Biennial of Painting Rufino Tamayo (2016), the award for the IX Biennial of Painting Alfredo Zalce (2014), the award for the IV Biennial of the Southeast in Chiapas (2005), finalist in the I International Biennial of Drawing in Tijuana (2006), prize for the XVII José Guadalupe Posada National Engraving Contest (2010), selected twice by the Takeda Biennial (2008 and 2012), among other mentions.

He has obtained multiple scholarships, in the state of Veracruz for PECDA (2005 and 2009), the FONCA Young Creators scholarship (2010 and 2012), and at the end of 2014, he became a Member of the National System of Art Creators of FONCA (SNCA) in the discipline of visual arts with a specialty in painting, again selected in the edition 2021-2024. In 2018, he received the distinction from the FONCA Promotion and Co-investment Program to carry out the exhibition El Centro Único of his authorship.

In 2018 he was part of the Selection Commission of the National System of Art Creators of FONCA, in the discipline of painting; the same year, he also participated in the three-member jury board for the XI National Biennial of Painting and Engraving Alfredo Zalce in Morelia, Michoacán.

To date, he has fifteen solo exhibitions in Mexico and abroad and more than forty-five group exhibitions in various cities within and outside of the country. He has shown his work in Buenos Aires, Argentina, England, Venice, Canada, the United States, Japan, Sweden, and Serbia, where he carried out an artistic residency in 2007. Among the collections where his work can be found, the following stand out: MACO Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Oaxaca (Collection of the Tamayo Biennial); Museo Nacional de la Estampa MUNAE, Mexico DF; Museo de Arte Contemporáneo Alfredo Zalce MACAZ, Morelia, Michoacán; Engraving Collection of the Instituto de Artes Gráficas de Oaxaca IAGO; José Guadalupe Posada Museum, Aguascalientes, Ags.; Artistic Collection of the State of Veracruz IVEC; Artistic Collection of the State of Tabasco, Mex.; Collection of Visual Arts of the State of Chiapas; Collection of the International Art Studio Radovan Tranavac Mica, Valjebo, Serbia; Artistic Collection of the Lithography Workshop of La Ceiba Grafica, Coatepec, Veracruz; The Luciano Benetton Collection, Italy; Grupo Milenio’s Collection, México D.F.; Collection of the Jagüey Institute, Teotihuacán, Mex.; Collection of the Friday Cottage Art Space, Columbia, SC., among other private collections.