For an artist, a drawing can represent the pure and first instinctive gesture of creating. In dialogue with a white paper, the artist can feel free to make mistakes, do experimentations, to undo ideas, add and delete traces, and to have an intimate relationship with his/her thoughts. A drawing could be less scary than a painting. And it can also be more significant and real. That is why the Drawing Room indicates a very important project and approach towards a certain kind of contemporary art.
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Its focus on the contemporary drawing is brilliant and interesting: first of all this attitude opens up to a new and fresh collector typology that can’t afford paintings or installation pieces, for instance. And also the drawing culture has deep and historical roots. A drawing is an immediate way to approach art. A sketch could represent a sort of diary made by the artist. In the last few years, we have been witnessing the proliferation of art fairs and hybrid art events.
These contemporary art incubators are trying to become crucial points for new and old collectors. And some of them are actually making good and even sophisticated choices. Drawing Room is one of such brave realities that we have been following since last year. Kooness team had an opportunity to visit Madrid in 2019. The venue was beautiful: Palacio Santa Barbara is a refined space made at the beginning of the last century in the city center. Its floors and ceilings are a perfect environment for the works. This year we can really “Party here today”, just to quote one of Lawrence James Bailey’s pieces on show. The fair path goes from Maria Jose Gallardo with “Sketchbooks” to the primitive ones by Jorge Vicén; from female portraits by Irene Gonzaléz to the hyper-realistic and colorful ones by Salustiano, where June’s – the same character for different drawings - face is the main subject. And, again, from the surreal landscapes by Toni van Tiel to the iconic New York buildings by Daniel Torres or the abstract geometries by José Loureiro.
So, from Madrid to Lisbon, Drawing room is growing and improving each year, step by step, thanks to the accurate selection of its galleries and also thanks to its prizes. Last year, during Drawing Room fourth edition, El Corte Inglés was awarded New Talent Award and then the Kells College Prize, the Navacerrada Collection, the Alice Cortes Prize and the Campocerrado Collection acted an important role to sustain galleries and artists. It is, in fact, fundamental to raise the quality among 73 artists presented by 30 galleries from Austria, Japan, France, Portugal, Italy and Spain, and share this drawing passion and work as much as possible.