URVANITY MAHOU TALKS

About the Speakers

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  Óscar Hormigos

  Óscar Hormigos (@eternaloscar) was born in Madrid in 1973. He graduated in Communication from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid and hasn’t been silent since.

  In 1997, at the age of 24, he became partner and director of WYSIWYG. From that year until 2001, the agency won a multitude of awards for its creativity (Cannes, San Sebastian, New York, FIAP, AMPE) and Oscar never missed a gala dinner.

  In the summer of 2001, he created the interactive communications agency Zentropy for McCann-Erickson WorldGroup. Zentropy's clients include companies such as Barclays, Coca-Cola, Dell, Loewe, Lois, Microsoft, Nokia, Telefonica, and Volkswagen...

  In July 2010, together with his friend David Cantolla, they founded Wake app! which is currently based in Austin, USA (a company that creates and develops its own applications from a different perspective, such as the innovative and award-winning Jorge Drexler's app).

  With the arrival of the new APP era, Oscar created The App Date in October 2010, with presence in 7 countries, it has become the reference site to talk about innovation, apps, and extended reality (AR/VR/MR).

   

  Oscar Hormigos is currently the general director of Onkaos, a Colección SOLO project that promotes artistic creation through new technologies.

  Onkaos works as a platform that helps artists working with new technologies in the conceptualization, production of work, legal assistance, certification, digital preservation, marketing, and commercialization strategy, among others. Artists such as Mario Klingemann, Smack, Novak Zen or Koka Nikoladze are currently part of this platform, capable of surprising us, generating curiosity and taking us to places where we have never been before.

  Colección SOLO is a project created by Ana Gervás and David Cantolla that promotes the accompaniment and dissemination of the international contemporary art scene.

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  Ampparito

  Ampparito (Madrid, 1991) develops his artistic practice mainly in the public space. By means of a language based on the alteration of normality and everyday essentials, he seeks to generate strange situations, actions, that leads from reflection to aesthetic contemplation or indifference.

   

  In most of the cases he makes his interventions independently. He has worked in very different places, from rural areas in Castilla y León to cities like Oslo, Dubai, St. Petersburg, Milan, or Basel.

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  Paco Pomet

  Irony, scepticism and above all humour dwells the universe of Paco Pomet (Granada, 1970). With a brilliant technique, he creates monochrome artworks with focused points of light that make them burn in full colour flames. He incorporates elements such as glowing suns and moons that give brightness to the play of whites and greys. 

   

  Being key in the wake of European modern figurative art, Pomet has participated in events such as Dismaland (2015) - curated by Bansky - as well as collaborated with international artists such as Takashi Murakami. His work can be found at the Spanish Academy in Rome, the Benetton Collection, the Colección DKV, the Colección SOLO, IVAM and The Patchett Collection, among others.

   

  Represented at Urvanity 2021 by: My Name's Lolita Art.

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  Sergio Mora

  Sergio Mora (Barcelona, 1975) is a daring, incisive, psychotropic and colourful kaleidoscope. This multidisciplinary artist, his prolific work, transports us to subversive worlds of fantastic creatures embodied in any of his production: painting, illustration, video, comic, performance, among others. An illusionist imaginary from which we discover a brilliant mythology mixed with fantasy and the spectacular. 

   

  His personal artistic decalogue and above all his pictorial idiosyncrasy, have made him the greatest exponent of pop surrealism in the peninsula, leading him to exhibit internationally, edit books, publish in numerous magazines, advertising campaigns and other collaborations.

   

  Represented at Urvanity 2021 by: Cerquone Gallery.

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  Bjørn Van Poucke

  For the past fifteen years, Van Poucke has been at the forefront of street art’s push for wider acceptance from both the public and the art world. 

   

  In 2011, he put together the first Belgian street art festival and has since been involved in the creation of over 250 murals in Belgium alone. In 2016, he was approached by the city of Ostend to develop what would become the country’s leading street art event, The Crystal Ship. The festival is now in its sixth year, with Van Poucke still at the helm. 

   

  After authoring two best-selling books on the subject, Street Art Today (2016) and Street Art Today 2 (2019), the curator co-founded the creative hub All About Things, coupling electrifying artists with ditto brands and cities. 

   

  It also operates Ruby Gallery, a Brussels joint for both emerging and established artists who like to do things a bit differently. Furthermore, Van Poucke is a frequent speaker at art festivals and fairs – from Paris to Miami – as well as colleges.

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  Nicolás Romero (Ever)

  Nicolás Romero (Buenos Aires, 1985) began twenty years ago signing “Ever” and doing graffiti in the streets of his native Buenos Aires, a city that was living the hangover of a military dictatorship that had lasted eight years and that at that time understood street art as an expression of freedom. He moved away from graffiti to start developing a mural work with which he experiments and plays with its symbolic charge in his confrontation with public space.

  
  At present, Nicolás is developing his work around the “Dead Natures”, with which through the union of elements he has found a way to use the image as a means of social reflection and anthropological research. He works through traces that he finds in his most immediate context, the result of the social network and symbols born from the coexistence of social, cultural, and economic factors. From soft drink bottles to religious prints, political symbols, contemporary icons or something as apparently innocent as fruits and vegetables are part of these compositions that he uses as a bridge to talk about more complex realities.

   

  Represented at Urvanity 2021 by: Ruby Gallery.

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  Juan Díaz - Faes

  Spanish artist Juan Díaz - Faes says that he “draws, eats and laughs in equal measure”. And if he stops, he gets bored. Blending visual humour with voluminous forms and a pared-down approach to character design, Díaz - Faes produces appealing creations across a range of different media. 

   

  Born in Oviedo, Spain, Díaz - Faes studied Fine Arts before moving to Madrid in 2011. He currently works as an illustrator, and is completing a PhD related to the creative arts. A long-term interest in poster design and professional experience as a camera operator and comic book writer both influence Juan Díaz - Faes’ creations, which skilfully combine both graphic and narrative elements. 

   

  Aside from commercial projects for clients such as Vodafone, Bombay Sapphire or the Goethe Institute, Díaz - Faes works with the digital entertainment firm, MUWOM, and contributes regularly to magazines such as Yorokobu and Ling. He also teaches illustration at the Instituto di Design, Madrid. Díaz-Faes has co-authored various books, including the witty “dictionaries of poo” Escacológico (2014) and Cromaticaca (2015). 

   

  In 2010, he illustrated Ismael Mª González Arias’ Les Puertes del Paraisu, which was awarded the Maria Josefa Canellada Prize for children’s literature, and has completed mural projects in Madrid, New York and Miami, among others.

   

  Represented at Urvanity 2021 by: Limited by SOLO.

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  Alex Hug

  Alex Hug is the face behind A HUG. Born in Madrid, with a multicultural background, she has spent the last years travelling through the capitals of Europe gathering knowledge and inspiration. 

   

  Having studied at Central Saint Martins and Parsons Paris, she finally graduated with honours in fashion design from Marangoni London and Manchester Metropolitan University. She has also completed a Master in Sustainable Fashion at ESMOD Berlin. Her work has always been highlighted by her critique of social and environmental issues. 

   

  Alex founded in 2016 A HUG, a sustainable alternative for the fashion industry. At A HUG she tries to transform the unwanted into wearable artworks. Reinventing the fusion of the embrace into clothing A HUG produces garments under a sustainable philosophy in which reuse, redesign and recycling predominate.

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  Amadine Urruty

  Sausages, mummies and bed-sheet ghosts live alongside dog-faced humans and children’s toys in Amandine Urruty’s beautifully drawn universes. Graphite lends a timeless, nostalgic feel, while the oddball creatures inside regard us with wicked ambivalence. 

   

  A self-confessed “weirdo” at school, Amandine Urruty always knew that she wanted to draw. In 2005 she completed a Master in Philosophy of Art at Toulouse University, followed by a brief spell as the lead vocalist in an underground band. Her illustrations soon drew interest from the art world and she was offered her first solo show in 2008. Since then, her drawings have been exhibited in Europe, the USA, Mexico and Asia, she has created large-scale wall murals in Thailand, Finland, Georgia and Spain, and published two books: Dommage Fromage (United Dead Artists, 2014) and Robinet D’Amour (Les Requins Marteaux, 2011). 

   

  Urruty’s busy worlds draw on her fascination with the Renaissance, Neoclassical and Romantic periods, her varied musical tastes and her passion for pencil and paper. Keen to keep her approach spontaneous and fun, Urruty works from her bed, building her images “like we would wander in the alleys of a Sunday flea market.” Visual bric-a-brac expertly transformed into delightful imagined realms.

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  Rita Amor

  Science and Restoration of Historical and Artistic Heritage (PH.D), she works in London as a conservator specializing in contemporary art. She also holds a degree in Fine Arts and a postgraduate degree in Conservation and Restoration of Cultural Heritage, both from the Universitat Politècnica de València (UPV).

   

  Since 2010, she combines her work in restoration with research in the application of conservation mechanisms on independent public and urban art. At the same time, she has worked in different research projects in conservation of mural painting, has participated in international conferences and symposiums in different European cities, and has publications, in both spanish and english, related to the study of conservation and dissemination of graffiti and urban art. Since 2014, she has actively collaborated during the creative process with artists Patricia Gómez and Mª Jesús González, in addition to employing the artist interview with artists linked to graffiti and urban art as part of her research. 

   

  Since 2018, she performs scientific committee and specialist work in various institutions and publications independently. Likewise, she has been invited as an external professor to give lectures and seminars on conservation at an international level in educational programs linked to Fine Arts, Aesthetics, Heritage and Conservation.

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  Ruth del Fresno - Guillem

  Ruth del Fresno-Guillem, an awareness raiser and a contemporary art conservator in private practice. Lives in Toronto, Canada, since 2012. Her research focus is currently linked to Performance Art and Contemporary Indigenous Artists; Gender and Cultural Perspectives and Identities. She mainly works with private collections. She has focused her attention on the artist's voice, particularly interested in intentionality and establishing a connection with the artist that helps her understand the idea of deterioration that concerns each particular artist. For this reason, the interview has become her primary working tool. She actively collaborates with VoCA, Voices in Contemporary Art, based in NY, for whom she interviewed the Cuban artist Gladys Triana in January 2020. In 2017 she received her Ph.D. from the Universitat Politècnica de València with a thesis focused on using the interview applied to a group of emerging artists. The interview was also the axis of study in her TFM. Three Catalan conceptual artists: Àngels Ribé, Francesc Torres and Vicenç Viaplana, were the focus of the research.

   

  As a professional, she is interested in raising awareness about conservation, investigating beyond materials and asking questions. To this end, she regularly participates in international congresses and conferences on contemporary art conservation. Or congresses that have nothing to do with conservation but have to do with art, where she has made the discipline of conservation visible to other professionals. She is interested in launching questions to provoke reflection among art professionals and artists. For this reason, she presents talks in the university and institutional environment.

  She is a member of several working groups such as the Spanish Contemporary and Actual Art Group (GE-IIC); TACG (Toronto Area Conservation Group) as well as CAC (Canadian Art Conservation), AIC-CAN (American Institute of Art); INCCA and a regular participant in VoCA. TestimoniArt is her data platform with interviews with over 100 artists at www.ruthdelfresno.com.

  She believes in shared knowledge, holistic work with professionals from all disciplines and respect. All this is her motto in work and life.

   

  "You can't care about something you don't know"; it is the principle that drives his quest.

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  Franco Fasoli

  Born in Buenos Aires in 1981, Franco Fasoli (also known as Jaz) is a stage designer and muralist. The art of Fasoli, who began using the streets as a canvas at the end of the 1990s, is influenced by his lifelong study of ceramics and the Argentinian capital’s iconic fileteado technique. Towards the end of the last decade, Franco turned his back on the traditional graffiti lettering and the subsequent representation of musical motifs associated with fileteado to introduce into his work the vivid contradictions of Latin American societies, their rituals and their seemingly perpetual instability.

   

  One of the most striking aspects of his work is its exploration of materials and scale. From large-format paintings in public spaces through to smaller works on bronze and paper, his art feeds on the fluctuation of contexts and resources.

  The tension between the dominant global culture and subcultures as spaces of resistance has also influenced him both at the conceptual level and in his actions throughout his career. Multiple forms of individual and collective identity form the sociological backbone of his work. Represented through conflict, confrontation and discursive juxtaposition, Fasoli does not seek to answer the question but rather to constantly rework the statement, questioning the questioning and returning to question himself.

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  Inti

  Inti Castro, artistically known as INTI (meaning sun in Quechua), is one of Latin America’s foremost street artists and an artistic ambassador to the world. Coming from a family dedicated to the arts and music, he started tagging the streets of his hometown Valparaiso at the age of 13. Working on the street gave him a freedom to explore from the earliest days of his artistic practice. Yet whilst the wall was his natural medium, he also went through formal artistic studies at the Fine Arts School of Viña del Mar. There he acquired the rigor and training of a professional painter. Life experiences and his street practice rounded off his formation.

   

  The post-Pinochet generation is looking back to the culture produced by their parents before and during the dictatorship and recognizing the past that was hidden during the dictatorship. Slowly, different identities are being recognized and their presence is being felt more in the public sphere. In particular, the indigenous identity that has been for so long hidden – both in times of the dictatorship and after – is slowly beginning to assert itself.

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  Mmmm... Collective

  Emilio Alarcón, Alberto Alarcón, Ciro Márquez and Eva Salmerón.

   

  Mmmm... is a Madrid-based group that has been creating public art projects, actions, reflexive objects, computer viruses and social models of exchange since 1998. Their production includes a life-size brick car that was placed on a parking space between two vehicles at the door of the Matadero. They have also scattered 100 couples kissing simultaneously among passers-by in the centre of Madrid. They have scattered an orchestra playing the same pieces of music synchronously in the streets of Washington. Or the design and installation of an obvious bus stop in Baltimore, composed by three big letters: BUS. In 2017 they carried out the action Human Rabbits, fifty people with large cardboard rabbit heads invaded the centre of Melbourne. The projects of mmmm... have been carried out, among other places, at the Museo Reina Sofía (Madrid, 2003 and 2010-2011), Instituto Cervantes (Beijing, 2007), Guggenheim Lab (New York, 2013), National Library of Australia (Canberra, 2016) or the Miami Design District (Miami, 2017).

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  Takk

  Takk is a space for architectural production focused on the development of material practices at the intersection between nature, culture, and politics, with a special attention to the challenges posed by the Anthropocene era. Directed by Mireia Luzárraga and Alejandro Muiño from Barcelona and Madrid, Takk combines its professional, research and academic activities. 

   

  His work belongs to the permanent collection of the FRAC Centre-Val de Loire and the Centre d'Art 2 de Mai. He has been exhibited at the Biennale de Rabat 2019, the Biennale d'Orleans 2019 and 2017, the Oslo Triennale 2016 Academy section, and the Spanish pavilion of the Venice Biennale 2014; as well as group exhibitions in Barcelona, Madrid and Milan, as solo exhibitions in Vienna or Barcelona. His work has participated in international photos such as GSAPP-Columbia University in New York, Thailand Design Center in Bangkok or Floating University in Berlin among others.

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  Angelo Milano

  Born in Grottaglie, after Semiotics studies in Bologna he decided to go back to his city in the Italian Puglia where he built StudioCromie, a DIY printing studio which later became an art gallery. He started FAME, a self-financed non authorized public art festival that became an international case. From 2012 he designs and produces his clothing brand SANGUE, distributed worldwide in a wide variety of high end stores that immediately got him bored of fashion. He keeps working as a galerist and collaborates with several international artists in the production of shows, installations and videos.