Brandy Trigueros – [↑] Untitled from The Dadabyte Theater (2017); [↓] Untitled from There’s No Other Like Your Mother (201X)
A while back a dear friend introduced me to Trigueros. I knew she was a photographer/image maker but our mutual friend didn’t show me her work until after we’d met.
Uh, she’s ridiculously talented y’all. Like woah!
Above, the topmost image is from her series The Dadabye Theater. It’s heavily informed by the visual aesthetic of Fernand Léger and Dudley Murphy’s avant-masterpiece Ballet Mécanique.
The lower image is from There’s No Other Like Your Mother–a series preoccupied with the death of both the artist’s parents as well as her own questions regarding whether or not to become a mother herself.
To appreciate the genius of the former you have to pay careful attention to the latter–I’m personally uncertain whether to term the work oneiric vs surreal but there is something preternatural familiar about the scenes. The compositions are clean with strong attention paid to conveying a totality of environment.
There’s also a killer eye for unity between form and function–a hallmark of high end design. (Her work reminds me a lot of Storm Thorgerson, actually.)
There’s also a lot of sort of kitschy, nostalgic and slightly off-kilter props. (My friend told me that she collects them specifically to use in her work.)
So while they are always used to excellent effect, there’s a way in which the kitsch, nostalgia and off-kilter fit even better within the frame of dadaism.
In my experience, it’s rare to encounter someone with such a strong sense of their own visual language. Trigueros has it in spades. But it’s quite another thing to be able to adapt your style to fit a particular framework. To me it’s incredibly astute that she decided to apply her preoccupations to an art movement where her interests not only fit but expand the original concept via their application.
Acetylene Eyes 