Kendall Art Cultural Center

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Gladys Triana

Gladys Triana in PERSPECTIVE - SOLO EXHIBITION

March 11th, 2022

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Every year the Kendall Art Cultural Center highlights an invited artist as part of its "Women in the Rodríguez Collection presents." The exposition, Gladys Triana in PERSPECTIVE displays a careful selection of works that demonstrates the artists' fruitful and prolific career. The curation of her paintings, drawings, photography and ceramic works act as a complete overview of Triana's trajectory as an artist. 

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"In my work," states the artist, "movement and fragmentation are essential. Like a dance, these geometric forms coalesce, merge, disperse, and distribute themselves across the page, evoking an immutable kineticism that reflects life itself and serves as the building blocks of the composition. I chose colors that I don’t typically work with to highlight our new variegated landscapes, both internal and external. The dynamics of these geometric forms come from a deep appreciation of human spirituality and an emphasis on the poetic foundation of my artistic life. I embraced this opportunity to express my optimism and freedom to create during the destruction that surrounded us."

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Gladys Triana was born in Camagüey, Cuba, and has resided in New York City since 1975. Triana completed her B.A. at Mercy College in 1976, and M.A. at Long Island University in 1977. She also studied printmaking at San Fernando University in Madrid, Spain from 1970-1972. In 1957, Triana’s paintings caught the eye of artist Mario Carreño, who was then the Director of the Museo de Bellas Artes in Havana, Cuba. Carreño decided to include her work in a group exhibition at the museum, which would mark the beginning of a long career for the self-taught Triana, who has since been described as one of the most authentic and versatile Cuban artists of her generation. Living in New York City since 1975, her work has rebelled—in ways overt and subtle—against society’s attempts to stereotype women and impose limitations on their freedom of expression.

 

Triana has received two CINTAS Fellowships in Art, two Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grants in 2015-16 and 2018-19, the Joan Mitchell Foundation’s CALL Program grant, and was the 2016 recipient of the Centro Cultural Cubano de Nueva York’s Amelia Peláez Award. From 1986 to 1988, Triana made 20 drawings in honor of women artists and intellectuals—including Käthe Kollwitz, Gabriela Mistral, Alexandra Exter, Mary Cassatt, and others—whose work had broken new ground in denouncing political oppression, war, and social injustice. Her first installation at the Museum of the Americas in Washington, which opened to critical acclaim in 1990, was an eloquent tribute to women trapped by domestic life. Her art often references women’s daily activities, exposing each mundane movement as an ephemeral event, and imbuing it with a hidden burst of creativity and life. Throughout her many artistic incarnations, Triana has revealed a constant need to avoid a traditional way of seeing. And so it is today with her photography, where she attempts to align the emotional realm with the poetry of the visual image.

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Triana’s artwork includes prints, drawings, collages, works on canvas, photography, films, and installations. Triana’s work has been presented in numerous solo exhibitions and group shows around the US and abroad, including in museums such as The Bronx Museum of the Arts, El Museo del Barrio, El Museo de Arte Moderno in Santo Domingo, El Museo de Bellas Artes in Santiago de Chile, El Museo de la Ciudad in Mexico, the Housatonic Museum in Connecticut, The NSU Art Museum of Fort Lauderdale, the Frost Art Museum in Miami, and the ASU Art Museum in Arizona.

Triana mentions Goya, Rembrandt, and Caravaggio as classical influences on her work, as well as modern artists such as Duchamp, Bacon, and works from the Futurism movement. Through various stages in her artistic career, Triana has focused on visual expressions of movement, fragmentation, transformation, and the interplay between light and shadow.

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