Sin título

Gastón Orellana is one of the founding members of Grupo Hondo, established in Spain in 1961. They worked in opposition to the post-war Informalism movement (the European parallel to American Abstract Expressionism). Grupo Hondo presented a style that was neither characterized by total abstraction nor by a return to pure figuration, but rather represented a synthesis of the two techniques. Its artists, among whom were included Juan Genovés, José Paredes Jardiel, and Fernando Mignoni, held the philosophy that art should be socially conscious and should serve as testimony to the violence of the times. Even after the group disbanded in 1964, Orellana continued to explore neo-figuration and themes relating to the pain of human existence, alienation, and the terror of state-sanctioned violence, particularly as it related to the rise of Pinochet’s dictatorship in Chile in the 1970s. Over the years, Orellana’s work while still socially aware became less explicitly political. In fact, by the 1990s the narrative aspect of his paintings had been replaced by a more minimal style that incorporated his interest in figuration with a turn towards lyrical abstraction. The pastel drawings in the IDB’s permanent art collection are representative of this evolution in his later style.